Jessica Marie Abou-Eid

The applicants, five co-accused in a complex drug trafficking prosecution, applied for a stay of proceedings under s. 11(b) of the Charter, arguing unreasonable trial delay.

The anticipated delay was approximately 26 months, exceeding the 18-month ceiling for provincial court trials.

The court dismissed the application, finding that the case was 'particularly complex' under the Jordan framework due to voluminous disclosure (over 75,000 pages), multiple judicial authorizations, and the nature of the joint prosecution.

The court also found that the Crown had developed and followed a concrete plan to minimize delay.

The applicants brought a motion challenging the validity of three general warrants (dated June 30, August 13, and October 8, 2015) authorizing video surveillance and covert entries at 691 Bank Street in Ottawa as part of Project Step, a drug trafficking investigation.

The central issue was whether an Ontario Court of Justice judge had jurisdiction to authorize video surveillance under section 487.01(4) of the Criminal Code, or whether such authorization required a Superior Court of Justice judge.

The court found that the applicants had standing to challenge the warrants based on a reasonable expectation of privacy in the hallway, albeit attenuated.

The court determined that video surveillance warrants must be signed by a Superior Court judge, not an Ontario Court of Justice judge, rendering the June 30 warrant invalid.

However, the court severed the covert entry portion of the June 30 warrant, which remained valid.

The court also quashed the portions of the August 13 and October 8 warrants authorizing entries into unit C, as the information supporting those entries was derived from the unlawful hallway surveillance.

Despite these findings, the court admitted all evidence under section 24(2) of the Charter, finding that exclusion would bring the administration of justice into disrepute given the good faith conduct of police and the attenuated privacy interests involved.

Following a five-day family law trial where the applicant was almost entirely successful, she sought costs.

The self-represented respondent did not file responding submissions.

The court found the respondent's behaviour during the litigation to be highly unreasonable, though not amounting to bad faith, as he failed to produce documents, reneged on a settlement, and prolonged the trial.

The court ordered the respondent to pay costs to the applicant in the all-inclusive amount of $26,173.99.

The moving party mother brought a motion seeking week-about parenting time for her two children, aged 15 and 8.

The Office of the Children's Lawyer reported that the older child preferred visiting every second Saturday, and the younger child preferred day visits only due to anxiety.

The court dismissed the request for week-about parenting, ordering day visits for the younger child on Saturdays and maintaining the current arrangement for the older child.

No costs were awarded.

The applicant sought spousal support and a monetary remedy of $59,400 for unjust enrichment following the breakdown of a seven-year common law relationship.

Both parties were initially in the military, but the applicant voluntarily left and subsequently struggled to maintain full-time employment.

The court dismissed the unjust enrichment claim, finding the respondent did not receive a tangible benefit from the applicant's career decisions.

However, the court found the applicant entitled to needs-based spousal support.

Finding the applicant intentionally under-employed, the court imputed income to her and awarded a lump sum spousal support payment of $16,276 for a four-year period.

The appellant appealed his conviction on the ground that the verdict was unreasonable and unsupported by the evidence.

The trial judge had convicted the appellant of several offences arising from his conduct at his father's business premises, where he appeared agitated, made gestures suggesting he was armed, and a loaded handgun was subsequently found at the rear of the building.

The Court of Appeal upheld the conviction, finding that the case was circumstantial in nature but that the trier of fact could reasonably conclude that the appellant's guilt was the only reasonable conclusion on the totality of the evidence.

The plaintiff brought an action against his insurer and three individuals after his truck was allegedly stolen and he was subsequently shot in the leg during a confrontation.

The plaintiff, the insurer, and one of the individual defendants each brought motions for summary judgment on consent.

The court found that the plaintiff had fraudulently reported his truck stolen after storing it in a defendant's barn, in an attempt to collect insurance proceeds.

Consequently, the plaintiff's claims against the insurer for breach of contract and negligence were dismissed.

The plaintiff's claims for physical and psychological injuries against the individual defendants were not suitable for summary judgment due to a lack of proper expert medical evidence and were directed to proceed to trial.

The defence counsel for Gurpreet Ronald sought to prohibit her former counsel, Mr. Bruce Engel, from testifying for the Crown, asserting solicitor-client privilege.

The court examined the validity of two waivers of privilege: a verbal waiver given on August 6, 2014, and a written waiver given on August 21, 2014, after consultation with independent counsel.

The court found the verbal waiver invalid due to the lack of independent legal advice but upheld the written waiver as valid and irrevocable, as the information had already been disclosed.

The court also clarified the scope of solicitor-client privilege, ruling that it covered communications between Ms. Ronald and Mr. Engel but not the content of Mr. Engel's subsequent conversation with co-accused Mr. Gill.

The application to prohibit testimony was dismissed.

The court issued two rulings during a murder trial.

First, it rejected the defence's argument that if one co-accused was acquitted, the other must also be acquitted based on conspiracy law, clarifying that the old common law rule for conspirators is no longer valid and, in any event, the accused were charged with murder, not conspiracy.

Second, the court denied the request to leave second-degree murder as an included offence to the jury, finding no air of reality in the evidence to support a conclusion of intentional but spontaneous killing, given the pre-meditated actions of the assailant.

The accused, Gurpreet Ronald and Bhupinderpal Gill, charged with first-degree murder, sought to edit their voluntary exculpatory statements given to police.

The Crown alleged the accused acted in concert to kill the victim.

The court reviewed legal principles for editing voluntary statements, emphasizing the balance between relevance, prejudicial effect, and the right to a fair trial in a joint proceeding.

The judge ruled that segments where the officer commented on the accused's credibility, advised them to tell the truth, or expressed opinions on co-accused's guilt should be excised as they are not probative and are prejudicial.

The accused sought an order permitting challenges for cause of prospective jurors based on race, religion, pre-trial publicity, marital infidelity, and employment bias.

The court permitted challenges for cause on the grounds of race, religion (by agreement), and pre-trial publicity, finding a realistic potential for bias that might prevent jurors from being impartial despite judicial instructions.

However, the court denied challenges for cause based on marital infidelity and employment bias, as the applicants failed to demonstrate widespread community bias or that potential jurors would be incapable of setting aside such biases.

The accused, jointly charged with first-degree murder, brought an application to sit with their counsel at trial rather than in the prisoner's dock.

The court reviewed the divided judicial approaches to this issue, including the Kaufman Commission's recommendation and the Ontario Court of Appeal's guidance in *R. v. Lalande*.

Despite the accused presenting no particular security risks and being in custody, the application was dismissed.

The court found that practical courtroom limitations prevented the accused from being adequately visible to the jury and witnesses from the counsel table, and that any potential stigma associated with the prisoner's dock could be addressed through jury instructions.

The accused, Gurpreet Ronald, applied for severance of her charges from those of her co-accused, Bhupinderpal Gill, in a first-degree murder trial.

The Crown alleged a conspiracy between the co-accused to kill Mr. Gill's wife.

Ms. Ronald sought severance due to the potential admission of evidence regarding her prior discreditable conduct, which Mr. Gill intended to use to raise reasonable doubt about his involvement.

The court dismissed the severance application, finding that the potential prejudice from the prior conduct evidence was low given the strong direct and circumstantial evidence linking Ms. Ronald to the death.

The court also determined that any potential prejudice could be mitigated by appropriate limiting jury instructions, affirming the presumption that juries follow judicial directions.

The appellants appealed their convictions for robbery, attempted robbery, and assault arising from three separate incidents that occurred over a 30-minute period.

They argued the verdicts were unreasonable, challenging the trial judge's findings on self-defence, identity, and common intention.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeals, finding that the trial judge's conclusions were amply supported by the evidence, which established that the appellants acted together as common participants in all three incidents.

Leave to appeal sentence was also denied.

In a first-degree murder trial, the Crown sought to admit hearsay statements of the deceased and evidence of prior discreditable conduct of the accused.

The court applied the principled approach to hearsay and the test for prior discreditable conduct, assessing relevance, necessity, reliability, and prejudicial effect.

Certain hearsay statements regarding the deceased's state of mind and marital unhappiness were admitted, as were some instances of the male accused's controlling behaviour.

However, vague allegations of physical abuse and a statement about visiting family were deemed unreliable and inadmissible.

The applicant, Gurpreet Ronald, sought a finding that a General Warrant issued under s. 487.01 of the Criminal Code breached s. 8 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and that evidence obtained from it should be excluded under s. 24(2) of the Charter.

The motion alleged material non-disclosure and misleading information in the Information to Obtain (ITO) the warrant, specifically regarding attempts to obtain DNA and the seizure of garbage.

The court found no material non-disclosure or misinformation, concluding that the information before the issuing justice was sufficient to establish reasonable and probable grounds for the warrant.

Consequently, the court found no breach of s. 8 of the Charter and upheld the warrant's validity.

The Crown sought a ruling on the voluntariness of statements made by two accused, Gurpreet Ronald and Bhupinderpal Gill, who were jointly charged with first-degree murder.

The defence disputed the voluntariness of specific videotaped interviews, arguing that the accused were suspects who should have been cautioned earlier or that the interviews were conducted oppressively.

The court applied the R. v. Oickle test for voluntariness, considering promises, threats, inducements, lack of operating mind, oppressive atmosphere, and police trickery, with a focus on oppression and the timing of suspect status.

The court found that the police did not have sufficient information to consider the accused as suspects requiring caution during their initial interviews and that the later interview of Gill, while forceful, was not oppressive.

All disputed statements were found to be voluntary and admissible.

In a joint trial for first-degree murder, defence counsel for co-accused Bhupinderpal Gill brought a motion to admit evidence of prior discreditable conduct by Gurpreet Ronald, specifically four incidents where she brandished a kitchen knife during domestic disputes with her husband.

Gill's defence was that Ronald acted alone and the killing was spontaneous, not planned.

Ronald's counsel argued the evidence was irrelevant, not probative, and highly prejudicial.

The Crown argued for modest probative value but admission.

The court found the evidence relevant to the issue of planning and deliberation, but not to the identity of the killer (as Gill's non-involvement was conceded).

The court balanced probative value against prejudicial effect, finding the risk of moral prejudice low and reasoning prejudice manageable with a limiting instruction.

The application was granted, admitting the evidence solely on the issue of planning and deliberation.

The applicant, charged with first-degree murder, sought leave to cross-examine the affiant of a general warrant that led to the collection of her DNA.

The applicant argued that the police failed to disclose opportunities to collect cast-off DNA without a warrant, which undermined the precondition that the warrant was in the best interests of the administration of justice.

The court applied the Garofoli test and granted leave, finding that cross-examination on the availability of cast-off DNA was necessary to ensure the applicant's right to make full answer and defence.

The applicant, charged with first degree murder, brought a motion requesting that the trial judge disqualify herself on the basis of a reasonable apprehension of bias.

The applicant argued that comments made by the judge during the applicant's bail hearing and in the reasons for decision demonstrated negative conclusions about the applicant's character.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that the comments were made in the context of assessing the evidence for the bail hearing and did not demonstrate a predisposition or prejudgment of the critical issues for the upcoming jury trial.