Mara Greene

The appellant was charged with failing to stop for a red light.

A trial date was set for May 24, 2016, then adjourned to September 12, 2016.

On September 12, 2016, the appellant attended court but the ticket was not before the court and the matter was not addressed.

A revised notice of trial was issued on September 21, 2016 for November 24, 2016, but the appellant did not receive this notice.

The appellant failed to attend the November 24, 2016 trial and was convicted in absentia.

On appeal, the appellant argued the court lost jurisdiction and sought either an acquittal or a new trial.

The court allowed the appeal, finding that while jurisdiction over the person was lost on September 12, 2016, it was regained by the issuance of the revised notice of trial.

However, because the appellant did not receive the notice and had always intended to dispute the charge, a new trial was ordered.

The accused sought leave under section 276 of the Criminal Code to cross-examine the complainant and adduce evidence regarding prior sexual activity between them.

The Crown charged the accused with sexually assaulting the complainant while she was asleep.

The accused sought to introduce evidence of: (1) a single prior act of sexual intercourse; (2) multiple acts of massaging over clothing; and (3) the complainant permitting the accused to photograph and video her while naked.

The court applied the three-part test under section 276, examining relevance, probative value, and prejudicial effect.

The court permitted cross-examination and evidence regarding the prior sexual intercourse and massaging incidents, finding them relevant to rebut the Crown's theory of motive and to establish the nature of the relationship.

The court prohibited admission of the actual photographs and videos but permitted cross-examination regarding the circumstances of their creation.

The accused pleaded guilty to trafficking a person under the age of 18 for the purpose of sexual exploitation, contrary to section 279.011(1) of the Criminal Code.

The victim was a 14-year-old girl who was forced into prostitution over a six-day period.

The court found that while the mandatory minimum sentence of five years was constitutionally valid as applied to the accused's circumstances, the provision violated section 12 of the Charter when considered against reasonable hypotheticals involving less serious conduct.

The court imposed a sentence of four years, less credit for pre-trial custody.

The accused was charged with being in care and control of a motor vehicle while impaired by alcohol and while having a blood alcohol concentration exceeding 80mg per 100ml of blood.

The accused was found asleep in his vehicle with the engine running in a parking lot at Exhibition Place.

The Crown alleged the accused was in care and control; the accused argued he had no intention to drive and was waiting for a friend to pick him up.

The court found no breach of Charter rights regarding the arrest and breath demand.

On the care and control issue, the court found the accused successfully rebutted the presumption of intention to drive and that there was no realistic risk of danger in the particular circumstances, resulting in an acquittal.

The accused was charged with sexually abusing his step-daughter over a six-year period beginning when she was eight years old.

The abuse included sexual touching, forced anal intercourse, and other sexual acts.

The accused initially could not plead guilty due to alcohol-induced blackouts preventing him from recalling the offences, but he accepted the victim's evidence as truthful and credible.

The court found him guilty of sexual touching of a child under sixteen.

At sentencing, the court imposed a six-year custodial sentence, balancing significant aggravating factors including the breach of trust, the victim's young age, the prolonged nature of the abuse, and the serious harm suffered by the victim, against mitigating factors including the accused's difficult childhood, his remorse, his steps toward rehabilitation, and his decision to accept responsibility without requiring the victim to testify at trial.

The applicant brought a section 11(b) Charter motion alleging a violation of his right to trial within a reasonable time.

The total delay from the laying of the information to the completion of trial was 21½ months, exceeding the 18-month ceiling established in R. v. Jordan.

The Crown sought to justify the delay by pointing to exceptional circumstances and defence delay.

The court found that while both parties bore some responsibility for the delay caused by a video copying error, this constituted an exceptional circumstance.

Additionally, the court found that the underestimation of trial time by counsel, made in good faith, also fell within exceptional circumstances.

After deducting approximately six months for these exceptional circumstances, the court concluded the delay was approximately 15 months and therefore did not violate section 11(b) of the Charter.

The accused was charged with driving with over 80 mg of alcohol in 100 ml of blood following a RIDE program stop.

The Crown did not dispute the accuracy of the breathalyzer readings but argued they should be admitted despite Charter breaches.

The court found two Charter violations: a section 10(b) breach due to failure to explain rights in the accused's language (Cantonese), and a section 8 breach due to the officer's failure to follow OPP protocol regarding potential sources of false positives on the approved screening device.

Applying the section 24(2) test, the court excluded the evidence and acquitted the accused.

The accused was charged with sexual assault following an incident on July 18, 2015.

The complainant attended a bar, consumed significant alcohol, and has no memory of events after approximately 2:00 a.m.

Surveillance video evidence established that the complainant became progressively more intoxicated throughout the night.

The Crown argued that the complainant lacked capacity to consent due to extreme intoxication.

The defence argued that the complainant's assumption about her lack of consent was unreliable and that the evidence did not establish incapacity beyond a reasonable doubt.

The trial judge found that while the complainant was severely intoxicated, the evidence established she lacked the cognitive capacity to consent to sexual activity.

The accused was convicted of sexual assault.

A sentencing decision involving a 67-year-old offender convicted of 102 counts of sexual abuse against 18 young male victims over a 30-year period spanning 1965 to 1995.

The offender systematically exploited positions of trust as a teacher's assistant, coach, and carnival worker to gain access to vulnerable children, whom he groomed and sexually abused.

The offender had previously been convicted in 1998 for similar offences against 24 other boys from the same time period, for which he received a six-year sentence.

The court imposed a sentence of six years, taking into account the offender's demonstrated rehabilitation over 15 years in the community without reoffending, his consistent use of anti-libidinal medication, his guilty pleas, and his engagement with support services, while balancing the need for denunciation and general deterrence.

The Crown applied for an order requiring the offender to be assessed by a psychiatrist to determine whether he should be declared a dangerous offender or long-term offender following his conviction for human trafficking, exercising control over persons, receiving material benefit from trafficking, withholding passports, and obstructing justice.

The court found that the offence of human trafficking constituted a serious personal injury offence and that there were reasonable grounds to believe the offender might be found to be a dangerous offender based on a pattern of repetitive sexual exploitation of female victims.

The court ordered a psychiatric assessment.

Avenue Building Corporation was charged under the Occupational Health and Safety Act with failing to ensure that equipment being moved was moved in a manner that did not endanger a worker, following an incident where an employee broke his leg when a 4x4 he was using to move a wall form broke.

The trial judge found the corporation guilty, concluding that the corporation failed to exercise due diligence by allowing workers discretion in tool selection without adequate training and supervision, and by failing to include written procedures for moving wall forms.

On appeal, the appellate court found that the trial judge misapprehended the specific charge and failed to properly apply the due diligence analysis to the correct actus reus, warranting a new trial.

The court determined whether the offence of human trafficking, as committed by the accused against two young women, constitutes a serious personal injury offence (SPIO) under section 752 of the Criminal Code.

The accused was convicted of exercising control over the victims, trafficking in persons, receiving material benefit from trafficking, withholding passports, and obstructing justice.

The court found that the trafficking offence met the SPIO definition through implied threats of violence and severe psychological harm, though the court declined to find that human trafficking inherently constitutes an SPIO in all cases.

The accused was charged with multiple firearm-related offences following the discovery of two unregistered revolvers in a garbage area outside his former residence.

The Crown's case relied heavily on circumstantial evidence and statements made by the accused to police.

The court found multiple Charter breaches: a section 10(b) violation when the accused was psychologically detained and questioned without being advised of his right to counsel, and section 8 violations relating to an unjustified strip search conducted without proper grounds and not in private.

The court excluded the accused's statements as a remedy under section 24(2) of the Charter.

On the merits, the court found that the Crown failed to prove possession of the firearms beyond a reasonable doubt, both without the excluded statements and, alternatively, on the basis that the accused's complete forgetfulness about the firearms negated the required mens rea for constructive possession on the date in question.

The accused was acquitted on all counts.

An appeal of a destruction order imposed on a dog under the Dog Owners' Liability Act.

The appellants conceded that their dog attacked two individuals but argued that a control order, rather than destruction, was appropriate.

The trial judge found the dog unpredictable and dangerous based on the severity of the attack and the owners' perceived lack of vigilance.

On appeal, the court found the trial judge made several errors in law and fact, including improperly rejecting uncontradicted evidence about the dog's prior good behaviour, relying on facts not in evidence (neutering's effect on aggression), and drawing unsupported inferences about future escapes.

The appellate court vacated the destruction order and imposed a strict control order instead.

The accused was charged with being in care or control of a motor vehicle while impaired by a drug.

He was found asleep in the driver's seat of a running vehicle on the Gardiner Expressway.

The defence conceded impairment but challenged the charge on Charter grounds, alleging violations of sections 10(b) and 8.

The court found that while the accused's section 10(b) rights were violated (delayed access to counsel), the violation was justified given his serious medical condition.

The court also found a section 8 breach regarding unlawful seizure of medical information by one officer, but declined to stay proceedings.

On the merits, the court rejected the accused's evidence regarding his reasons for being on the expressway and found him guilty of the offence.

The accused was charged with first-degree murder in the death of Delano Coombs.

At the preliminary inquiry, the Crown sought to admit a 3.5-hour audio-recorded statement made by Jerome Bent, a separately charged co-accused, to an undercover police agent (Jermaine Graham) for the truth of its contents.

The defence sought to admit a separate, unrecorded statement by Bent regarding a hoody he allegedly dropped at the scene.

The court applied the principled approach to hearsay evidence under the necessity and reliability test.

While necessity was conceded, the court found that the Crown's proposed hearsay evidence did not meet the threshold reliability standard due to multiple frailties, including: the declarant's initial untruthfulness about the accused's involvement, leading and suggestive questioning by the undercover agent, minimal corroborating evidence directly linking the accused to the murder, and the absence of visual cues critical to assessing credibility.

The defence application regarding the hoody statement was similarly rejected despite substantial corroborating evidence, as the statement lacked sufficient indicia of reliability beyond the corroboration.

Both applications were dismissed.

The defendant was charged with numerous firearm-related offences following the discovery of two loaded firearms in his bedroom.

The sole issue at trial was the lawfulness of the police search.

Police attended the defendant's residence in response to a 911 call regarding his health.

While paramedics assessed him, officers entered his bedroom without consent to locate clothing for the defendant.

During this search, officers discovered a firearm in a bag on the bed.

A warrant was subsequently obtained to search the bedroom, resulting in the seizure of a second firearm.

The defendant challenged the lawfulness of the initial warrantless search and the validity of the warrant based on evidence obtained through the unlawful search.

The accused was charged with impaired driving and driving with over 80 mg of alcohol in 100 ml of blood following an incident on March 15, 2014.

The Crown invited acquittal on the impaired driving charge due to insufficient evidence of actual impairment.

The trial focused on Charter violations: whether the arrest and breath demand were made on reasonable and probable grounds (Section 8), whether breath samples were taken as soon as practicable, and whether the accused's detention for a show cause hearing was lawful (Section 9).

The court found the arrest was made without sufficient grounds, the breath samples were obtained in violation of Section 8 rights, and the detention was unlawful and arbitrary based solely on the accused's status as a non-citizen.

The court excluded the breath sample evidence under Section 24(2) and granted a stay of proceedings based on systemic police training failures regarding release provisions.

The accused was charged with drug-related offences following a police search warrant executed at his residence.

The Crown sought to rely on the "step six" process from R. v. Garafoli to have the court consider redacted portions of the Information to Obtain (ITO) that were excised to protect the identity of a confidential informant.

The defence opposed this request, arguing that the Crown's summary of the redacted material did not provide sufficient information to mount a proper challenge to the warrant's validity.

The court conducted a detailed analysis of whether the summary adequately disclosed the nature of the redacted information under the three Debot criteria: credibility of the informant, corroboration, and compellability.

The court found that the step six process could be applied on a partial basis, allowing the Crown to rely on the unredacted ITO for certain paragraphs where the summary provided sufficient detail, while restricting the Crown to the redacted version for other paragraphs where the summary was inadequate.

The defendant was charged with impaired driving and driving with over 80mg of alcohol in 100ml of blood following a motor vehicle collision on April 28, 2013.

This was the second section 11(b) Charter application challenging the delay in bringing the matter to trial.

The trial commenced on June 16, 2014 (approximately 14 months after arrest) but did not conclude, requiring a continuation date of October 3, 2014 (an additional 109 days of delay).

The court found total state-caused delay of 11.5 months, exceeding the Morin guidelines by six weeks.

The defendant suffered actual prejudice including stress, anxiety, sleep disturbance requiring medication, and loss of a job opportunity.

Balancing the defendant's prejudice against the serious nature of the offence and strong societal interest in trial on merits, the court found the delay constitutionally intolerable and granted a stay of proceedings.