Lisa Sturgess

The Court allowed the appeals and held that former section 117 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act was overbroad under section 7 of the Charter.

It captured humanitarian aid, mutual aid among asylum-seekers, and assistance to family members, which fell outside Parliament’s objective of targeting organized people smuggling.

Attorney General consent to prosecute did not cure the constitutional defect.

The Court read down the former provision to exclude those protected categories and remitted the charges for trial.

The appellants were convicted of first-degree murder at their retrial after their initial convictions were overturned.

At the retrial, they testified voluntarily but gave different accounts than they had at their first trial.

The Crown cross-examined them on these prior inconsistent statements to impeach their credibility.

The appellants argued this violated their right against self-incrimination under s. 13 of the Charter.

The Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the appeals, overruling its previous decision in R. v. Mannion.

The Court held that s. 13 does not protect an accused who voluntarily testifies at a retrial on the same indictment from being cross-examined on prior voluntary testimony, as the compulsion required to trigger the s. 13 quid pro quo is absent.

The accused voluntarily went to a police station and asked that officers be sent to a ranch where he lived, but refused to answer questions about why they were needed.

Police discovered three murder victims at the ranch.

At trial, the judge instructed the jury that the accused's silence was post-offence conduct from which an inference of guilt could be drawn.

The accused was convicted, but the Court of Appeal ordered a new trial.

The Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the Crown's appeal, holding that the right to silence exists even before detention or arrest, and that silence cannot be used as post-offence conduct to infer guilt.

The appellant, who suffers from paranoid schizophrenia, was found not criminally responsible for various offences and was conditionally discharged by the Review Board.

He challenged the constitutionality of section 672.54 of the Criminal Code, arguing it violated sections 7 and 15(1) of the Charter.

Applying the companion decision in Winko, the Supreme Court of Canada held that the provisions do not violate the Charter, as they are carefully crafted to protect the liberty of the NCR accused while ensuring public safety.

The appeal was dismissed.