The appellants were convicted of first-degree murder after the victim was brutally beaten and robbed in an underground parking garage.
On appeal, they argued the trial judge erred by excluding out-of-court statements from a deceased third party who had confessed to the murder, by misdirecting the jury on reasonable doubt, and by misdirecting the jury on the elements of first-degree murder based on unlawful confinement.
The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding the third party's hearsay statements lacked threshold reliability, the reasonable doubt instruction was adequate, and unlawful confinement in the course of a robbery can provide the basis for first-degree murder under s. 231(5)(e) of the Criminal Code.
