Michael Lacy

The appellants, a police officer and an employee of the Office of the Public Guardian and Trustee, were convicted of defrauding an elderly man's estate using a fabricated will.

They appealed their convictions and sentences, arguing errors in the trial judge's refusal to stay proceedings for a Charter breach, admission of after-the-fact conduct evidence regarding the concealment of their affair, and an unbalanced jury charge.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeals, finding no error in the trial judge's evidentiary rulings, jury instructions, or the sentences imposed.

The appellant was convicted of first degree murder, conspiracy to commit murder, and arson in relation to the death of his wife.

The Crown's case relied heavily on the hearsay utterances of a co-accused, obtained during a Mr. Big operation, who confessed to the murder and claimed the appellant hired him.

The co-accused refused to testify at trial.

The appellant appealed his convictions, arguing the trial judge erred in admitting the hearsay evidence and in his instructions to the jury regarding the hearsay evidence, bad character evidence, and the co-conspirator's exception to the hearsay rule.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no error in the trial judge's threshold reliability analysis or jury instructions.

Summary conviction appeal from convictions for sexual interference and voyeurism arising from incidents at a shopping mall involving a 15-year-old complainant and surreptitious recordings of teenage girls.

The appellant argued that the trial judge relied on improper assumptions about innocent behaviour, misapprehended the complainant's evidence about the nature of the touching, and reversed the burden of proof in her credibility analysis.

The court rejected all conviction grounds, holding that the impugned findings were open on the record, the complainant's evidence was assessed contextually, and the reasons disclosed substantive compliance with the W.D. framework.

The appeal from sentence succeeded only in part because the 20-year SOIRA order exceeded the statutory maximum for summary conviction offences; the order was reduced to 10 years but otherwise upheld.

In a professional discipline hearing, the member admitted misconduct arising from counselling a client with an acquired brain injury while lacking relevant competence, using abusive and demeaning communications, breaching confidentiality, and engaging in boundary violations and conflicts of interest through overlapping family representation and personal self-disclosure.

The Panel found the admitted facts established multiple breaches of the governing regulation, the Code of Ethics, and the Standards of Practice Handbook, and further found the conduct disgraceful, dishonourable, and unprofessional.

Applying the public-interest approach to joint submissions, the Panel accepted the jointly proposed order.

The member was reprimanded, suspended for four months with one month remittable on compliance, made subject to remedial terms and education requirements, and ordered to pay $5,000 in costs.

The appellant, a police superintendent acting as Incident Commander during the 2010 G20 Summit, appealed convictions for professional misconduct relating to the mass arrests of protestors at the Novotel Hotel and the intersection of Queen and Spadina.

The Hearing Officer found the arrests were unlawful and constituted an unnecessary exercise of authority, and that the appellant committed discreditable conduct by leaving detainees in inclement weather.

The Ontario Civilian Police Commission dismissed the conviction appeals, finding the Hearing Officer correctly applied the law regarding reasonable and probable grounds and the ancillary powers doctrine.

On the cross-appeals regarding penalty, the Commission found the original penalties (a reprimand and forfeiture of 10 days off) were unreasonable given the severity of the Charter breaches.

The Commission varied the penalties to the forfeiture of 20 days off for each of the two unlawful arrest convictions, to be served consecutively with the 20 days off forfeited for discreditable conduct.