Katie Doherty

The Crown appealed the acquittal of the respondent on two counts of sexual assault.

The trial judge acquitted the respondent based on credibility findings regarding the complainant, relying on eleven factors that the trial judge described as significant but not determinative.

The Court of Appeal found that the trial judge's credibility assessment was tainted by reliance on discredited myths and stereotypes about sexual assault victims, including assumptions about the complainant's dress, the absence of immediate reporting, and expected victim conduct.

The Court held that the trial judge's reasoning, anchored in "common sense and life experiences," impermissibly adopted stereotypical reasoning that had no place in assessing credibility.

The Court found a sufficient nexus between the legal errors and the acquittal, and allowed the appeal, setting aside the acquittal and ordering a new trial.

The appellant was convicted of two counts of attempting to purchase sexual services from a young person through an undercover police sting operation (Project Raphael).

He was sentenced to eight months in jail and two years of probation.

On appeal, the appellant challenged his conviction on Charter grounds and sought leave to appeal his sentence.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal, finding the arrest was lawful and the trial judge properly applied the legal test for objective reasonableness.

However, the Court allowed the sentence appeal, reducing the sentence to six months less one day to preserve the appellant's right of appeal to the Immigration Appeal Division, as a sentence exceeding six months would result in deportation as a permanent resident.

The appellant was convicted of robbery with a firearm, uttering a death threat, and carrying a concealed weapon arising from a confrontation on October 4, 2014.

He received a global sentence of five years incarceration, less time served.

The appellant brought two Charter applications under section 11(b) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms to stay the charges for unreasonable delay.

The application judge dismissed the first application, finding that although the net delay of approximately 20 months exceeded the 18-month presumptive ceiling for provincial court trials, the presumption was rebutted by transitional exceptional circumstances.

The trial judge dismissed the second application after conviction.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal found that the application judge erred in calculating the net delay by treating a 66-day period as defence delay when it was not solely attributable to the defence and had not been waived.

The corrected net delay was approximately 23 months.

The Court also found that the application judge inadequately analyzed the transitional exception, failing to properly scrutinize whether delays were reasonably incurred under the pre-Jordan framework.

The Court allowed the appeal and stayed the charges.

The appellant appealed a four-year penitentiary sentence imposed after conviction on counts of sexual interference and sexual assault involving a 15-year-old cousin when the appellant was 20 years old.

The single act of sexual contact resulted in pregnancy.

The appellant argued the trial judge erred in stating the appropriate sentencing range and failed to apply principles governing custodial sentences for youthful first offenders.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding the sentencing range was appropriate given the intimate nature of the contact, the relationship between the parties, and the significant consequences to the complainant.

The court set aside only the victim surcharge.

The appellant was convicted by jury of aggravated assault and three firearm offences arising from an incident at an after-hours restaurant where the appellant allegedly fired a gun twice inside the establishment and then shot the victim in the stomach and hand upon exit.

The central issue at trial was identification.

Three witnesses recanted prior statements to police in which they had identified the appellant, but the trial judge admitted the prior statements as hearsay evidence based on procedural reliability.

The Court of Appeal upheld the conviction, finding the verdict was not unreasonable and the trial judge properly instructed the jury on identification evidence and post-offence conduct.

The appellant's sentence of 12 years global (8 years for aggravated assault, 4 years concurrent for careless use of firearm, 4 years consecutive for pointing firearm, 4 years concurrent for possession of weapon, less 32 months pre-sentence custody credit) was upheld as fit.

The Crown appealed after the Court of Appeal ordered a new trial for an accused convicted of sexual interference.

The Crown had relied on the complainant's pregnancy as corroborating evidence of the assault, while the application judge had dismissed the accused's s. 276 application to cross-examine the complainant on other possible causes of the pregnancy.

The majority held that both the application judge and the trial judge erred, but applied the curative proviso under s. 686(1)(b)(iii) on the basis that the cross-examination that actually occurred allowed the defence to adequately test the Crown's evidence.

The dissent would have dismissed the appeal, holding that the restriction on cross-examination deprived the accused of an entire process of questioning and that the errors were neither minor nor harmless.

The appellant appealed his convictions on three counts of fraud over $5,000 and possession of property obtained by crime over $5,000, as well as seeking leave to appeal his custodial sentence of two years less a day.

The sole ground of appeal was that the trial judge erred in dismissing the appellant's s. 11(b) Charter application regarding delay.

The trial judge found that the delay, which exceeded the Jordan presumptive ceiling of 18 months for provincial court trials, was justified by exceptional circumstances including the appellant's inability to represent himself and the complexity of the case.

The Court of Appeal upheld the conviction appeal dismissal and granted leave to appeal sentence only to set aside the mandatory victim fine surcharge order.

The appellant appealed his convictions for two counts each of robbery, aggravated assault, and discharge of a firearm with intent to wound, arising from a bank robbery in Toronto.

The appellant challenged the lawfulness of his initial arrest on unrelated drug charges, arguing that evidence linking him to the bank robbery should have been excluded as the product of constitutional infringement.

The Court of Appeal upheld the trial judge's finding that the arrest was based on objectively reasonable grounds and dismissed the appeal.

The appellant A.R. appealed his conviction on six counts of sexual assault, two counts of uttering threats, and two counts of assault arising from allegations of domestic violence against his ex-wife between 2011 and 2013.

He received a global sentence of four years.

The appellant challenged the trial judge's assessment of the complainant's credibility and alleged differential scrutiny of witness testimony.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal, finding the trial judge properly assessed credibility and gave adequate reasons for accepting the complainant's evidence on each count.

The sentence appeal was not addressed as it was contingent on the conviction appeal being allowed.

The appellant appealed her conviction for aggravated assault of her sometimes girlfriend.

The trial judge found that the appellant caused the complainant's multiple serious wounds, rejecting the appellant's position that the injuries were self-inflicted.

The appellant argued the trial judge erred in taking judicial notice of matters requiring expert evidence, specifically regarding the cause of bruising and blood stain evidence.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding that the trial judge properly drew inferences from the evidence using common sense and human experience, without improperly taking judicial notice of matters requiring expertise.

The appellant was convicted of aggravated assault arising from a collision during a recreational hockey game.

The Court of Appeal allowed his initial appeal and ordered a new trial due to impermissible speculative reasoning by the trial judge.

On retrial, the appellant applied for a stay of proceedings under section 11(b) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, arguing unreasonable delay.

The trial judge dismissed the stay application and convicted the appellant again.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, finding that the delay in the retrial was unreasonable and breached the appellant's right to trial within a reasonable time.

The court held that the clock for calculating delay should have started from the date the Court of Appeal ordered the new trial, not from when the summons was issued.

The court also found that the Crown failed to prioritize the retrial and breached its duty to expedite proceedings by insisting on consecutive trial dates when earlier non-consecutive dates were available.

The appellant was convicted of sexual assault and sexual interference against his 15-year-old cousin.

The Crown relied on the complainant's pregnancy as corroborating evidence of the assault.

The application judge dismissed the appellant's section 276 application seeking to cross-examine the complainant about other sexual activity that could account for her pregnancy.

The trial judge, who took over after the application judge became unable to continue, held that he was bound by the application judge's ruling.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, finding that the application judge erred in refusing the cross-examination and that the trial judge erred in holding himself bound by the prior ruling.

The court ordered a new trial.

The appellant was charged with speeding contrary to section 128 of the Highway Traffic Act following a motor vehicle collision that resulted in a fatality.

At the first appearance, the justice of the peace noticed that the information contained a defective date (November 18, 2017 instead of November 18, 2016) and quashed the information of his own motion without considering amendment procedures or granting the Crown an opportunity to make submissions.

The Crown sought certiorari, and the Superior Court judge found the justice of the peace had committed jurisdictional error.

The appellant appealed, arguing the circumstances were analogous to London v. Young and that sections 34 and 36 of the Provincial Offences Act did not apply at a first appearance.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, holding that the justice of the peace erred in law by quashing the information without following the statutory amendment and quashing procedures, and by failing to afford the Crown procedural fairness.

An appeal under Part XX.1 of the Criminal Code from a disposition of the Ontario Review Board dated June 29, 2017.

The appellant, found not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder for theft, challenged the Board's decision to continue his detention with specified community privileges.

The appellant conceded he remained a significant risk to the community but sought 72-hour passes rather than the 48-hour passes recommended by the Hospital.

The Board found the appellant remained a significant threat and imposed a detention order with the Hospital's recommended privileges.

The appellant appealed, arguing the Board misapprehended evidence regarding his diagnosis and his insight into his illness.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no error in the Board's reasoning or findings.

The applicant sought judicial interim release pending determination of his motion for leave to appeal his sentence to the Supreme Court of Canada under s. 40 of the Supreme Court Act.

The applicant had been convicted of four indictable offences related to unauthorized possession of a loaded .45 calibre handgun and was sentenced to 21 months imprisonment followed by two years probation.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the application for release, finding that the applicant failed to demonstrate that his application for leave to appeal was not frivolous and that his detention was necessary in the public interest.

The appellant sought leave to appeal from a conviction entered by the Ontario Court of Justice.

The Court of Appeal considered whether the case met the criteria for granting leave to appeal under the second category established in R. v. R(R.).

The court found that the appellant had not established sufficient grounds for leave to appeal and refused the application.

The appellant was convicted of robbery and failing to remain at the scene of an accident arising from a carjacking on May 24, 2016 in Ottawa.

The case turned on identity.

The victim testified that the appellant was not the man who attacked him, providing confused and unconvincing evidence about a prior high school connection and a bar encounter.

The trial judge rejected the victim's testimony as unreliable and hazy, and instead relied on video evidence, testimony from the Brown brothers, and DNA evidence to find the appellant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

The Court of Appeal upheld the conviction, finding no error in the trial judge's findings and that the verdict was amply supported by the evidentiary record.

During a trial for first degree murder, the accused brought two motions seeking further instructions to the jury at the end of the jury charge.

The first motion sought an instruction to disregard evidence elicited in re-examination regarding the accused's prior interest in firearms.

The second motion sought an instruction that the Crown's failure to call the accused's girlfriend as a witness constituted a gap in the evidence providing a basis for reasonable doubt.

The trial judge dismissed both motions, finding that the re-examination evidence was necessary to correct a false impression left during cross-examination, and that the failure to call the witness did not leave a gap in the Crown's case as she was an unnecessary and unreliable witness.

The accused, charged with first degree murder, brought a motion to override the Attorney General's refusal to consent to a judge alone trial under s. 473(1) of the Criminal Code, arguing that extensive adverse pre-trial publicity from a prior murder conviction rendered a fair jury trial impossible.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that the demanding standard for Charter relief was not met and that traditional safeguards, including challenge for cause, should be attempted first.

The court granted the alternative motion to challenge prospective jurors for cause based on pre-trial publicity and approved a set of six questions for the jury selection process.

In a pre-trial motion for a first-degree murder trial, the Crown sought to admit various pieces of circumstantial evidence, including firearms purchases, text messages, and statements made by the accused.

The court applied the test of balancing probative value against prejudicial effect.

The court ruled that evidence of a handgun purchase shortly before the victim's disappearance was highly probative of intent and planning and thus admissible.

However, evidence of other firearms purchases and certain highly prejudicial text messages referring to other criminal activities were excluded or ordered to be edited.

Evidence of the financial relationship between the co-accused was deemed admissible to show the nature of their relationship.