Jim Marshall

The appellant, a criminal defence lawyer, was convicted of smuggling drugs into the Toronto Jail for a former client during a professional visit.

On appeal, he argued that the trial judge applied uneven scrutiny to the evidence and erred in refusing to order the production of third party records relating to the prevalence of drug smuggling at the jail.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, finding that the trial judge subjected the appellant's evidence to a stricter level of scrutiny than the Crown's evidence, and erred in concluding that the third party records were not likely relevant.

A new trial was ordered.

The Crown appealed the accused's acquittals for possession for the purpose of trafficking and possession of property obtained by crime.

The trial judge had excluded evidence of drugs and cash found in the accused's condominium unit under s. 24(2) of the Charter, finding that the police violated the accused's s. 8 rights by surreptitiously entering the common areas of the building without a warrant to gather information for a search warrant.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, holding that the accused had a reasonable expectation of privacy in the common areas of his small condominium building and that the trial judge did not err in excluding the evidence.

The moving party, Toshiba of Canada Limited, sought leave to appeal an interlocutory order denying its motion for production of the Commissioner of Competition's internal inquiry commencement memorandum and for leave to cross-examine the affiant of an ex parte order.

The ex parte order required Toshiba to produce records under section 11 of the Competition Act.

The Divisional Court held that the underlying proceeding was criminal in nature, meaning the Criminal Proceedings Rules applied, which do not provide for an appeal of an interlocutory order.

The court also rejected the argument that the motion could be treated as a civil proceeding for declaratory relief under the Charter.

Consequently, the court found it lacked jurisdiction and denied leave to appeal.

The appellants operated a mail fraud scheme involving fake invoices for an Internet business directory, generating over $1.1 million in revenue.

They were convicted of misleading advertising under the Competition Act.

The trial judge sentenced two appellants to 34 months' imprisonment and a $400,000 fine each, and the third to a nine-month conditional sentence and a $100,000 fine.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal upheld the custodial sentences and the fines for the two main perpetrators, finding that the 1999 amendments to the Competition Act signaled Parliament's intent to treat serious misleading advertising as criminal fraud.

However, the court reduced the third appellant's fine to $35,000 due to his lesser involvement.