Julian K. Roy

The Catholic entities appealed an order allowing residential school survivors to archive their Independent Assessment Process (IAP) documents with the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation without the consent of alleged perpetrators.

Canada cross-appealed, arguing the IAP documents were government records subject to federal archiving and privacy legislation and could not be destroyed.

The Court of Appeal dismissed both the appeal and cross-appeal, holding that only claimants have the right to decide whether to archive their documents.

The Court further held that the IAP documents are not government records because they are not under government control, and upheld the supervising judge's order to destroy the documents after a 15-year retention period to protect the claimants' privacy and confidentiality.

The appellants appealed a decision dismissing their application for certiorari to quash a summary conviction trial judge's order requiring them to attend part of their trial.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no error by the certiorari judge and reiterating that criminal trials should not be interrupted by interlocutory appeals or certiorari applications absent exceptional circumstances.

The applicant requested to reactivate their human rights application, which had been deferred pending the conclusion of a coroner's inquest.

The coroner's inquest concluded and the jury rendered its verdict and recommendations.

The respondent did not respond to the request.

The Tribunal granted the request to reactivate the application.

The applicants, suppression firefighters, sought judicial review of a Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario decision that summarily dismissed their age discrimination applications.

The applicants challenged the mandatory retirement age of 60, arguing the employer failed to accommodate them by not engaging in individualized testing for cardiac risk.

The Divisional Court dismissed the application, finding the Tribunal reasonably relied on established precedent that mandatory retirement for firefighters is a bona fide occupational requirement, and that the applicants failed to provide the necessary individualized medical evidence of extremely low cardiac risk to trigger the narrow exception for accommodation.

The appellant appealed a disciplinary hearing decision that dismissed charges of neglect of duty against two police officers.

The officers had investigated a fatal motor vehicle collision involving a pedestrian and declined to demand an approved screening device (ASD) sample from the driver, despite the driver's admission to consuming one or two beers earlier in the evening.

The Ontario Civilian Police Commission upheld the hearing officer's finding that the officers did not have a reasonable suspicion that the driver had alcohol in his body at the time of the accident, as there were no physical indicia of alcohol consumption or impairment.

The Commission concluded that the officers reasonably exercised their discretion under section 254(2) of the Criminal Code and dismissed the appeal.

Following earlier decisions concerning requests for directions in litigation arising from the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement, the court had previously awarded costs payable by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to Independent Counsel.

After that decision was released, Canada delivered additional submissions asserting it should not be liable for costs, and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission asserted a right to file further reply submissions.

The court held that the additional submissions were unnecessary and procedurally improper because the parties had already been given the opportunity to address costs.

The judge confirmed that the earlier costs decision would not be altered and refused to permit further reply submissions.

Following earlier reasons concerning Requests for Direction under the Indian Residential School Settlement Agreement regarding the treatment of Independent Assessment Process documents, the court addressed costs.

Independent counsel who represented the interests of claimants sought full or substantial indemnity costs against the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

The court held that although the commission’s request for directions was reasonable and undertaken pursuant to its mandate, independent counsel had effectively acted as amicus curiae and provided helpful submissions on behalf of claimants.

Considering the partial success of the parties and the reasonableness of the amounts claimed, the court exercised its discretion to award reduced partial indemnity costs.

The appellant sought leave to appeal convictions arising from late-night shouting on a residential street and an interaction with police.

The court held that the causing a disturbance analysis is contextual and that it was open to the trial judge to find the offence made out on the evidence.

The court also rejected the argument that the appellant was psychologically detained when he pushed one of the officers, relying on evidence that he was free to proceed to his house.

Leave to appeal was dismissed.

Requests for directions were brought regarding the disposition of documents generated in the Independent Assessment Process established under the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement.

The moving parties sought guidance on whether the documents, which contained highly sensitive narratives of abuse and personal information, should be archived or destroyed.

The court held that the documents were confidential, subject to the implied undertaking and the law of breach of confidence, and were created for a private adjudicative process.

Interpreting the settlement agreement and exercising supervisory jurisdiction over the class action settlement, the court concluded the documents must ultimately be destroyed after a retention period.

During the retention period, claimants must be notified of their option to consent to the transfer of redacted records to the National Research Centre for Truth and Reconciliation.

The applicants sought judicial review of an interlocutory ruling made by a coroner at the outset of an inquest into a police shooting.

The ruling limited the scope of cross-examination of two police officers regarding their consultations with counsel prior to making their notes.

The Divisional Court dismissed the application on the basis of prematurity, holding that courts should not intervene in ongoing administrative proceedings, particularly coroner's inquests, absent exceptional circumstances that would result in a fundamental failing of justice.

The applicants, a group of firefighters, alleged age discrimination after being required to retire at age 60.

They argued that the respondents failed to accommodate them by not developing an individual testing regime to assess their cardiac risk, relying on an exception discussed in previous jurisprudence.

The Tribunal held a summary hearing under Rule 19A to determine if the applications had a reasonable prospect of success.

The Tribunal found that the duty to accommodate does not require an employer to develop a testing regime upon a general request, and the applicants had not presented evidence of an exceptionally low cardiac risk to trigger an individual exception.

The applications were dismissed for having no reasonable prospect of success.

The United States of America sought the extradition of the respondent for the offence of child luring.

The perpetrator communicated with a 17-year-old female online and coerced her into engaging in sexual activity with her 13-year-old sister over a Skype video call.

The communications were traced to an IP address assigned to the respondent at the relevant time.

The court found that the IP subscriber information provided a sufficient foundation for a reliable inference that the respondent was the perpetrator, satisfying the test for committal under the Extradition Act.

The application for committal was granted.

The appellant filed a police misconduct complaint under the Police Services Act and commenced a parallel civil action for damages arising from the same arrest.

After the disciplinary hearing officer found the officers not guilty, the respondents successfully moved to strike the civil claims on the basis of issue estoppel.

The Supreme Court of Canada, in a 4-3 decision, allowed the appeal, holding that while no public policy rule should categorically exclude police disciplinary hearings from issue estoppel, the Court of Appeal erred in its discretionary analysis by failing to consider the significant differences in purpose, scope, and stakes between the two proceedings, the parties' reasonable expectations, and the unfairness of permitting the Chief of Police's designate's decision to exonerate the Chief from civil liability.

The Truth and Reconciliation Commission sought directions regarding Canada's obligations under the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement to provide documents archived at Library and Archives Canada (LAC) and documents relating to the TRC's legacy mandate.

Canada moved to strike the TRC's request, arguing the TRC lacked capacity and standing, and moved to strike several affidavits.

The court held that the TRC had capacity to bring the proceedings and declined to strike most of the affidavits.

On the substantive issues, the court ruled that Canada's obligation to provide relevant documents extends to those archived at LAC, but that the TRC's legacy mandate does not include evaluating Canada's policy responses, meaning Canada need not produce documents relating to those responses.

The applicant, a student support worker and legal guardian of a troubled student at the same school, alleged that the school board discriminated against him on the basis of family status when it terminated his contract.

The school board maintained that the applicant was terminated because he inappropriately used his paid work hours to advocate for his ward, creating a conflict of interest and disrupting staff.

The Tribunal dismissed the application, finding no clear link between the applicant's family status and his termination, as the dismissal resulted from his inability to separate his role as an employee from his role as a parent during school hours.

The applicants sought judicial review of an interlocutory decision by the Coroner refusing to issue a summons for the production of videos depicting interactions between correctional staff and the deceased, Ashley Smith.

The Divisional Court found that the Coroner applied an incorrect and overly stringent test by requiring a demonstrated 'nexus' between the videos and the death, rather than assessing whether the evidence was 'material' to the purposes of the inquest.

The Court quashed the Coroner's decision and remitted the issue for reconsideration, holding that the denial of access to potentially relevant evidence constituted a breach of natural justice.

During a judicial review application challenging a coroner's decision not to compel the advance production of tapes for an inquest, an issue arose regarding access to information on USB keys.

The Divisional Court ruled that there was no formal motion before the court regarding media access.

Furthermore, the court determined it did not need to access the information on the USB keys at that time, as the parties had already accessed the information and referred to it in their materials without apparent prejudice.

The families of two deceased First Nations persons and the Nishnawbe Aski Nation sought to challenge the representativeness of the jury rolls for two coroners' inquests, arguing that First Nations persons living on reserves were systematically excluded.

The presiding coroners refused to issue summonses to the director of court operations to inquire into the jury roll preparation.

The Court of Appeal held that coroners have jurisdiction by necessary implication to inquire into the representativeness of a jury roll and to remedy an unrepresentative list.

The Court found sufficient evidence to warrant the summonses, allowed the appeals, and ordered a new inquest into one of the deaths.

The applicants sought judicial review of a Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario decision that found they had discriminated against an employee on the basis of ancestry, ethnic origin, creed, and sex.

The Divisional Court set aside the Tribunal's decision, finding it to be patently unreasonable and procedurally unfair.

The adjudicator erred by refusing to accommodate a key witness for the employer, drawing an adverse inference from that witness's absence, and making findings of discrimination regarding a microwave policy and dress code that were unsupported by factual findings or logical legal reasoning.

The matter was remitted for a new hearing before a different adjudicator.

The appellant and a co-accused were jointly tried for first-degree murder.

The co-accused advanced a cut-throat defence and adduced highly prejudicial bad character evidence against the appellant, including statements that the appellant had killed before.

The appellant was convicted and the co-accused was acquitted.

On appeal, the appellant argued the bad character evidence was inadmissible and the jury instructions regarding its use were inadequate.

The Court of Appeal held that the evidence was admissible but found the trial judge erred by failing to provide adequate positive and negative instructions on how the jury could use it.

However, the Court applied the curative proviso, concluding that the evidence of the appellant's participation in the murder was so overwhelming that a properly instructed jury would inevitably have convicted him.

The appeal was dismissed.