Marlys Anne Edwardh

In a Reference directed by the Minister of Justice under s. 696.3(3)(a)(ii) of the Criminal Code regarding the 1959 murder conviction of Steven Murray Truscott, the parties sought directions on the scope of the issues.

The Court of Appeal ruled that the Reference is limited to the issue of fresh evidence, which means material not presented in prior court proceedings (including the 1966 Supreme Court Reference).

The Court further held that the Kaufman Report does not limit the evidence the parties can tender, and that transcripts from the Kaufman investigation are part of the record but must satisfy hearsay exceptions to be admitted for their truth.

In the context of a ministerial reference regarding Steven Murray Truscott's 1959 murder conviction, the court addressed two preliminary issues.

First, the court granted the appellant's request to have the panel hear witness evidence viva voce rather than out of court.

Second, the court dismissed a motion by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation to permit camera access to the proceedings, finding that recording is prohibited under s. 136(1) of the Courts of Justice Act and the statutory exemptions did not apply because the Crown did not consent.

The Crown appealed a stay of proceedings granted to the respondents, who were charged with first-degree murder in the death of their infant daughter.

The trial judge stayed the charges due to unreasonable delay under s. 11(b) of the Charter, largely caused by the failings of the Crown's pathologist.

The Court of Appeal found that the trial judge erred in including pre-charge delay in his calculation as a remedy for the cremation of the child's remains.

However, the Court upheld the stay, concluding that the post-charge delay of 55 months for one respondent and 42.5 months for the other was unreasonable and severely prejudiced their liberty and security interests.

The Court of Appeal for Ontario issued procedural directions for the hearing of a Reference directed by the Minister of Justice concerning the 1959 murder conviction of the appellant.

The Reference is to be heard as if it were an appeal on the issue of fresh evidence.

The directions address the preparation and sealing of the Record, the scope of the Reference, and the potential release of specific paragraphs of the Kaufman Report.

The appellant was found not criminally responsible for an assault with a weapon due to a mental disorder.

The Review Board ordered his transfer to a medium security hospital with privileges, applying the 'least onerous and least restrictive' test to the conditions of his detention.

The Court of Appeal held this test only applied to the choice of disposition, not the conditions.

The Supreme Court of Canada allowed the appeal, holding that the 'least onerous and least restrictive' requirement under s. 672.54 of the Criminal Code applies to both the disposition and the particular conditions forming part of it.

The accused, a lawyer, was charged with sexual offences arising from a large-scale police investigation.

During the trial, it emerged that the Crown had failed to disclose notes and a will-say statement of a former police officer who had contacted the mother of one of the complainants.

The trial judge recused himself from hearing a stay application due to a reasonable apprehension of bias, and another judge heard the application.

The application judge found that Crown counsel had wilfully withheld the materials and ordered a stay of proceedings and costs against the Crown.

The Crown appealed.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal, finding that the application judge had jurisdiction to hear the matter, but erred in finding wilful non-disclosure.

The evidence showed the non-disclosure was inadvertent.

The Court held that a stay of proceedings and costs against the Crown were not justified for inadvertent non-disclosure.

The stay and costs orders were set aside, and a new trial was ordered.

The appellants appealed a decision of the Prince Edward Island Court of Appeal finding an Internet lottery scheme unlawful under the Criminal Code.

The Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the appeal from the bench, adopting the reasons of the Chief Justice of Prince Edward Island.

The appellant requested access to personal information held by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS).

CSIS refused to disclose the information, claiming exemptions under the Privacy Act for national security and foreign confidences.

The appellant challenged the constitutionality of s. 51 of the Privacy Act, which mandates in camera and ex parte hearings when these exemptions are claimed.

The Supreme Court of Canada held that the mandatory ex parte provision did not violate s. 7 of the Charter.

However, the mandatory in camera provision violated s. 2(b) of the Charter and was not saved by s. 1 because it was overly broad.

The Court read down s. 51(2)(a) to apply only to the ex parte submissions.

On a cross-appeal, the Court held that the law enforcement exemption in s. 22(1)(b) is not limited to current investigations.

The appellant appealed a finding that he was a dangerous offender and the resulting indeterminate sentence.

He had pleaded guilty to twenty sexual offences against young boys.

Due to a procedural error, two informations covering the same conduct were before the court, and the trial judge mistakenly referred to '39 convictions'.

The Court of Appeal held that this procedural irregularity did not vitiate the process and that the trial judge's reference was an inadvertent error.

The court found that the dangerous offender designation and the indeterminate sentence were reasonably supported by the evidence.

The appeal was allowed only to set aside the convictions on the first information, but the appeal regarding the dangerous offender application was dismissed.

The police obtained ex parte search warrants to seize video footage and photographs from various media organizations following a violent demonstration at Queen's Park.

The media organizations challenged the validity of the warrants, arguing they should have been given notice and an opportunity to make submissions before the warrants were issued, and that the police failed to disclose an alternative source of video footage.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, holding that the issuing justice had the discretion to proceed ex parte and did not commit jurisdictional error.

The court also found that the failure to disclose a secondary security camera system was not fatal to the warrants' validity.

The respondents, two Canadian citizens who were 18 at the time of the offences, were wanted in the State of Washington for three counts of aggravated first degree murder.

The Minister of Justice ordered their extradition without seeking assurances that the death penalty would not be imposed.

The respondents challenged the constitutionality of this decision.

The Supreme Court of Canada held that while sections 6(1) and 12 of the Charter were not directly violated, extraditing the respondents to face the death penalty without assurances violated their rights under section 7 of the Charter.

The Court found that the principles of fundamental justice, informed by Canada's abolition of the death penalty, international trends, and concerns over wrongful convictions, require the Minister to seek assurances in all but exceptional cases.

The violation could not be justified under section 1.

The Minister's appeal was dismissed.

The appellant appealed a sentence of six-and-a-half years' imprisonment after pleading guilty to incest.

He argued the sentence exceeded the usual 3-5 year range and that insufficient weight was given to his major depression and subsequent exemplary conduct.

The court held that the sentencing judge did not err because the offence involved a lengthy breach of trust and an aggravating circumstance not present in the comparator authority, namely pregnancies resulting from the abuse.

Leave to appeal sentence was granted, but the sentence appeal was dismissed.

The appellant was convicted of aggravated assault for allegedly burning her 3½-year-old granddaughter's face on a stove.

At trial, the unsworn child testified against the appellant, and both sides called expert witnesses regarding the burns, the child's memory, and child abuse.

The Supreme Court of Canada ordered a new trial, finding that while the child was properly permitted to testify, the trial judge erred by allowing an expert witness to testify that the child's behaviour indicated long-term abuse and to improperly comment on the child's credibility.

The Court also found errors in the Crown's cross-examination of a defence expert using unproven learned treatises.

The respondent attacked his parents-in-law while sleepwalking, killing his mother-in-law and seriously injuring his father-in-law.

At trial, he presented a defence of non-insane automatism, supported by uncontradicted expert medical evidence that sleepwalking is a sleep disorder, not a neurological or psychiatric illness.

The trial judge left only the defence of non-insane automatism with the jury, which acquitted the respondent.

The Court of Appeal upheld the acquittal.

The Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the Crown's appeal, holding that on the evidence and policy considerations, sleepwalking in this case did not stem from a 'disease of the mind' and was properly classified as non-insane automatism, entitling the accused to an absolute acquittal.

The appellant challenged both the common law rule allowing the Crown to raise insanity over an accused’s objection and the Criminal Code provision requiring automatic detention of an insanity acquittee pending the pleasure of the Lieutenant Governor.

The Court held that the common law rule violated s. 7 because it impermissibly deprived an accused of control over the conduct of the defence, and it reformulated the rule so that the Crown may generally raise insanity only after the trier of fact has otherwise concluded the accused is guilty, or where the accused has put mental capacity in issue.

The Court further held that s. 542(2) was intra vires Parliament’s criminal law power, but violated ss. 7 and 9 of the Charter because it mandated automatic, arbitrary, and indeterminate detention without a hearing and without standards.

The appeal was allowed, a judicial stay of proceedings was entered, and the declaration of invalidity was suspended for six months with interim detention limits.