Harry S. LaForme

The appellant, a leader of the Galloway Boyz gang, appealed his convictions for attempted murder and firearms offences arising from a drive-by shooting in April 2004.

The Crown conceded that warrantless wiretap evidence obtained under section 184.4 of the Criminal Code breached the appellant's section 8 Charter rights.

The sole issue was whether the intercepted communications should be excluded under section 24(2) of the Charter.

The motion judge admitted the evidence, finding that exclusion would bring the administration of justice into disrepute.

The Court of Appeal conducted a fresh section 24(2) analysis under the Grant framework and upheld the admission of the evidence, dismissing the appeal.

Three appellants appealed their convictions for drug trafficking offences arising from Project O'Bunker, a large joint forces investigation in London, Ontario.

The appellants challenged the dismissal of their s. 11(b) Charter applications alleging unreasonable delay, and one appellant also challenged his conviction on the merits.

The Court of Appeal dismissed all appeals, finding that while the total delay of 39-40 months exceeded the presumptive ceiling of 30 months established in R. v. Jordan, the delay was justified by the exceptional complexity of the prosecution and the transitional exceptional circumstance based on reasonable reliance on the previous Morin framework.

The appellant was convicted of attempted fraud over $5,000 and sentenced to five months' imprisonment and 30 months' probation.

He appealed both conviction and sentence.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal, finding the trial judge's credibility findings and analysis of evidence were fair and even-handed.

However, the court allowed the sentence appeal based on clarification of the law regarding immigration consequences of conditional sentences by the Supreme Court of Canada in R. v. Tran.

The court substituted the custodial sentence with an 18-month conditional sentence.

The appellant appealed his conviction on multiple charges of sexual assault, non-sexual assault, and threatening with sexual violence.

The appellant and complainant had been in a relationship from 2002 to 2009.

The complainant alleged multiple incidents of sexual assault involving demands for anal intercourse and vaginal fisting, which the appellant claimed were consensual.

After a six-day jury trial, the appellant was found not guilty on one sexual assault charge but guilty on all other charges and sentenced to 4.5 years in custody.

The appeal raised issues of trial fairness regarding Crown counsel's improper cross-examination about the complainant's attractiveness and the appellant's sex drive, Crown counsel's closing address, and the trial judge's charge to the jury.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal.

The appellant appealed his convictions for importing heroin and possession of heroin for the purpose of trafficking, as well as sought leave to appeal his sentence.

The appellant did not dispute physical possession of 146 grams of heroin delivered by FedEx from India.

His defence was that he believed he was receiving electronics for a fee of $800 as part of an import scheme.

The trial judge rejected this explanation as neither credible nor plausible and convicted him.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal on all grounds, finding no error in the trial judge's reasoning regarding the actus reus and mens rea of importing, the appellant's knowledge or wilful blindness, the proper drawing of inferences, the burden of proof, and the Crown's cross-examination.

The court also dismissed the sentence appeal, finding the six-year concurrent sentences fit given the nature and amount of heroin, financial motive, and prior criminal record.

The appellant was convicted of importing cocaine after returning to Canada from Panama with two suitcases containing 1.5 kilograms of cocaine in secret compartments.

She claimed she was unaware of the drugs.

The Court of Appeal allowed her appeal on the basis that the trial judge admitted inadmissible expert evidence regarding courier knowledge without proper jury instructions, and ordered a new trial.

The court found that expert testimony suggesting couriers know they are carrying drugs constituted impermissible anecdotal evidence under R. v. Sekhon that invited the jury to reason from generalized conclusions about other cases to the appellant's specific state of mind.

The appellant sought habeas corpus relief and Charter remedies regarding his immigration detention.

The application judge dismissed the habeas corpus application but granted section 24(1) relief for a section 12 Charter breach, ordering the appellant's transfer from a maximum security provincial facility to an immigration detention centre.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal dismissed the appellant's appeal and allowed the respondent's cross-appeal, finding that the appellant failed to establish a section 12 breach and that the application judge erred in his analysis of the legal test and evidentiary foundation required for such a claim.

The appellant, convicted of first-degree murder in 2001 and sentenced to life imprisonment without eligibility for parole for 25 years, challenged the constitutionality of judicial screening provisions introduced into the "faint hope" clause.

When the appellant committed the murder in 1995, she had an automatic right to apply directly to a jury for a reduction in her parole ineligibility after serving 15 years.

By the time she was eligible to apply in 2013, legislation required her to first satisfy a judge that there was a "substantial likelihood" her application would succeed before a jury could hear it.

The Court of Appeal held that the retrospective application of the 2011 judicial screening amendments violated her Charter rights under section 11(i), as the amendments increased her punishment by substantially decreasing her chances of obtaining a reduction in parole ineligibility.

Two separate representative actions were brought on behalf of approximately 800 terminated employees of bankrupt meat processing companies.

The first action (Caetano) was brought by a union representative on behalf of 700 unionized employees; the second (Abreu) was brought by non-union employees on behalf of approximately 100 non-unionized employees.

The defendants moved to stay the Caetano action on jurisdictional grounds and to strike the representative elements of both actions as statute-barred.

The motion judge stayed the Caetano action and struck the representative aspect of the Caetano action but allowed the Abreu action to proceed.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal dismissed the Caetano appeal and allowed the Abreu appeal, striking the representative aspect of the Abreu action as well.

The appellant, a self-represented litigant, appealed a trial judgment granting sole custody of three children to the respondent with specified access rights, ordering child support of $622 per month based on an imputed income of $31,600, and requiring an equalization payment of $211,220.17.

The appeal raised issues concerning access time for religious and festive occasions, the inclusion and valuation of a Pakistan pension for income imputation purposes, and the inclusion and valuation of Pakistan property and jewelry for equalization purposes.

The appellant also alleged trial judge bias.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no palpable and overriding errors of fact and no evidence of bias.

The appellant appealed from orders made over ten years prior determining equalization, child support, and spousal support in a family law proceeding.

The appellant had failed to appear at trial in 2007 and at a subsequent motion to set aside the trial order in 2008.

The Court of Appeal admitted fresh evidence demonstrating the appellant's serious mental health issues, including PTSD and major depressive disorder, which rendered her incapable of attending the proceedings.

The court found that the appellant's absence was excused and that procedural fairness required setting aside the trial and motion orders.

The court ordered a new trial to determine the issues of equalization and support, set aside a garnishment order, and required the respondent to return garnished funds with interest.

The appellant appealed a motion judge's decision dismissing his second motion to change child and spousal support and granting the respondent's cross-motion.

The appellant had failed to produce required financial disclosure, including income tax returns, despite multiple court orders over two years.

The motion judge dismissed the motion based on this failure to disclose.

The appellant sought to introduce his 2015 and 2016 tax returns as fresh evidence on appeal.

The Court of Appeal declined to admit the fresh evidence and upheld the motion judge's decision, finding the appellant had not met the test for introducing fresh evidence and had failed in his fundamental duty to disclose financial information.

The court rejected the appellant's procedural fairness arguments, noting he had benefitted from judicial indulgences rather than suffered unfairness.

The appellant, New Era Development (2011) Inc., appealed a summary judgment decision granting fees of $400,000 to the respondent mortgage broker, Rescon Financial Corporation, and dismissing New Era's counterclaim.

The dispute concerned whether Rescon was entitled to commission upon producing an acceptable commitment letter or only upon actual funding.

The motion judge found the commitment letter acceptable, rejected New Era's defences based on fiduciary duty breach, negligence, and statutory violations, and dismissed the counterclaim.

The Court of Appeal upheld the decision on all grounds, finding no genuine issues requiring trial.

The appellant appealed from a Superior Court order dismissing his action as frivolous, vexatious, and an abuse of process.

The motion judge found that the action amounted to an attempt to relitigate unsuccessful proceedings before the Canadian Human Rights Commission, Canada Labour Code adjudicator, Federal Court, and Federal Court of Appeal, with bald allegations of fraud, obstruction of justice, blackmail, and criminal conduct lacking factual foundation.

The Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal, finding no merit in the appellant's three grounds of appeal: unlawful application of Rule 2.1.01(1), malicious use of language by the motion judge, and alleged infringement of Charter rights.

The appellant appealed the dismissal of her action for delay.

The action arose from two separate events in 2009—an alleged slip and fall accident and a motor vehicle accident—and had been ongoing since 2011.

A timetable was imposed in 2015 requiring completion of discoveries, mediation, and trial set-down by specific dates.

The appellant failed to comply with the timetable.

The motion judge dismissed the action for inordinate and inexcusable delay, finding the appellant failed to rebut the presumption of prejudice and that a fair trial was no longer possible.

The Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal, finding no error in the motion judge's analysis.

The appellant appealed the dismissal of her application for a declaration that she holds a permanent easement over part of the respondent's property.

The two parties own neighbouring houses in Toronto.

The appellant claimed a right of easement over the passageway between the properties based on historical use by the former owner of her property for cleaning and repairs.

The application judge found that the historical use was permissive and infrequent, not "as of right" as required for a prescriptive easement.

The Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal, finding no error in the application judge's characterization of the occasional permissive use and affirming that the threshold for establishing an easement is high.

The Ombudsman of Ontario appealed a Divisional Court decision that held neither the Election Compliance Audit Committee nor the Property Standards Committee of the City of Hamilton constituted "local boards" within the meaning of section 14.1 of the Ombudsman Act.

The Ombudsman sought to investigate whether these committees complied with the public meeting requirement under section 239 of the Municipal Act, 2001.

The Court of Appeal upheld the Divisional Court's decision, applying the ejusdem generis principle to conclude that the general language in the definition of "local board" does not extend to investigative/adjudicative bodies that do not carry on the day-to-day operations of the municipality.

Consequently, the Ombudsman lacked jurisdiction to investigate these committees' compliance with open meeting requirements.

The respondent brought a motion to add WSP Canada Inc. as a defendant in an ongoing negligence action arising from the rehabilitation of a bridge.

The motion judge granted the motion, finding that the respondent's claim against WSP was not statute-barred under the Limitations Act, 2002 because the claim was not reasonably discoverable within the two-year limitation period.

WSP appealed to the Court of Appeal.

The Court of Appeal quashed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction, holding that the motion judge's order was interlocutory rather than final.

The motion judge's determination regarding the limitation period was made solely for purposes of deciding the motion to add a party and did not finally determine the limitations issue, which could be relitigated at trial.

The respondent moved to delist an appeal pending the outcome of outstanding matters in the Superior Court.

The Court of Appeal considered whether it should exercise its discretion to delist the appeal or allow it to proceed as scheduled.

The court determined that the appeal court was the appropriate forum to address the fundamental issue on appeal regarding whether an order made in the absence of the appellant should stand.

The motion was dismissed and the appeal was permitted to proceed as scheduled.

Costs were awarded to the responding party on a partial indemnity basis.

The appellant appealed a summary judgment decision from the Superior Court of Justice.

The Court of Appeal found no error in the motion judge's legal analysis regarding contractual interpretation, no material misapprehension of evidence, and no failure to consider relevant evidence.

The motion judge's factual findings met the reasonableness standard.

The appeal was dismissed with costs awarded to the respondent.