Megan Conway Andrews

The offender was convicted of receiving material benefits from sexual services after selling cocaine to a sex worker and encouraging her to continue sex work to pay for the drugs.

The Crown sought a 3-year penitentiary sentence, while the defence sought a 12-month conditional sentence.

The court considered the unique facts, noting the offender was not a 'pimp' but a drug dealer, and weighed mitigating factors including the offender's rehabilitation, family support, and systemic factors related to anti-Black racism.

The court imposed a 17-month conditional sentence followed by 12 months of probation.

During a first-degree murder trial, the defence sought to admit a text message sent by the accused to a police officer inquiring about his mother's life insurance policy.

The Crown opposed, arguing it was self-serving hearsay.

The court found that while the text was presumptively inadmissible hearsay, it should be admitted under the principled exception to the hearsay rule.

The court held that the statement's substantive reliability was corroborated by other evidence and that fairness to the accused required its admission to provide a complete picture of his statements regarding the insurance policy.

The accused, charged with first-degree murder, applied to re-open a pre-trial statement voir dire under section 551.3(4) of the Criminal Code.

The accused argued that fresh evidence showing he received pre-interview advice from a disbarred lawyer acting as a paralegal, rather than a licensed lawyer, undermined the original finding that his statement to police was voluntary and compliant with the Charter.

The court dismissed the application, holding that the fresh evidence could not have affected the original ruling, as the accused was not detained at the time and had explicitly declined to exercise his right to counsel even if he had been detained.

In this omnibus Charter application arising from a human trafficking and sexual assault prosecution, the applicants challenged multiple search warrants, production orders, arrests, detentions, right to counsel breaches, delayed bail appearances, alleged racial bias, negligent investigation, and disclosure failures.

The court found several serious Charter breaches, including invalid judicial authorizations relating to one dwelling, one phone, and one production order, unreasonable manner of search at one residence, multiple right to counsel breaches, and unlawful delay in bringing two accused before a justice.

A stay of proceedings was granted to one applicant because cumulative and partly systemic misconduct would further prejudice the integrity of the justice system if the prosecution continued.

Another applicant obtained exclusion of his police statement and cellphone evidence under s. 24(2), while the remaining applications for a stay were dismissed.

The three accused were charged with various offences related to the human trafficking and sexual exploitation of an 18-year-old complainant.

The Crown alleged that one accused recruited the complainant into the sex trade, acted as her pimp, and exploited her while she suffered from a severe cocaine addiction.

The other two accused were alleged to have participated in her exploitation, sexual assault, and procuring.

The court carefully assessed the complainant's credibility, noting her memory was affected by trauma and heavy drug use, but found her core allegations against the primary accused were corroborated by digital evidence and the recovery of firearms she disposed of on his behalf.

The primary accused was found guilty of human trafficking, procuring, receiving material benefits, advertising sexual services, unauthorized possession of a firearm, and uttering threats.

The second accused was found guilty only of receiving a material benefit from sexual services (selling her cocaine), and acquitted of the other charges due to reasonable doubt.

The third accused was acquitted of all charges due to the unreliability of the complainant's evidence against him.

A defence application for a stay of proceedings based on lost police cruiser video and unrecorded interviews was dismissed.

The accused, a Muay Thai boxing coach, was convicted of sexual assault and sexual interference against a 14-year-old student.

The sexual interference occurred on a flight when the accused placed his hand underneath the victim's shorts and cupped her buttocks while she slept.

The court imposed a 90-day intermittent custodial sentence, finding that a conditional sentence was inappropriate given the breach of trust, the grooming behaviour that preceded the offence, and the significant psychological impact on the victim.

The court also imposed a two-year probation with restrictive conditions, a 10-year SOIRA order, a 5-year section 161 prohibition order, and a DNA order.

The accused, a Muay Thai boxing coach, was charged with sexual assault under section 271 of the Criminal Code and sexual interference under section 151 of the Criminal Code.

The allegations arose from an incident on a return flight from training in Thailand, where the complainant, a 14-year-old student, alleged that the accused touched her buttocks while she was sleeping on his lap.

The accused denied the allegations and claimed to have been asleep.

The court found the complainant to be a credible and reliable witness and rejected the accused's testimony as not credible.

The court also found a pattern of boundary violations by the accused in his relationship with the complainant, including inappropriate physical contact and intimate gestures.

The Crown proved both offences beyond a reasonable doubt.

The applicant social housing provider sought access to youth criminal records relating to a young person whose charges had been stayed.

The applicant intended to use the records to commence eviction proceedings against the young person's family based on an alleged illegal act.

The court dismissed the application, finding that while the applicant had a valid interest in the records, granting access was not desirable in the interest of the proper administration of justice.

The court emphasized the young person's heightened privacy rights, the presumption of diminished moral blameworthiness, and the potential harm to the young person's rehabilitation and family support if eviction proceedings were facilitated.

The accused was charged with sexual assault and sexual interference arising from an alleged touching of a person under 16 years of age that occurred on an international flight from South Korea to Toronto.

The defence applied to quash the Information for lack of jurisdiction, arguing that because the flight terminated in Peel Region, the charges should have been laid there and heard in Brampton rather than Newmarket.

The court dismissed the application, finding that section 7(1)(b) of the Criminal Code deems offences committed aboard aircraft terminating in Canada to have been committed in Canada, permitting prosecution in any territorial division.

The court further found that Newmarket was the most convenient forum given that the investigation was conducted by York Regional Police, the complainant and key witnesses resided in York Region, and the accused lived in North York.

Toronto Community Housing Corporation sought access to youth court records of a tenant to use in eviction proceedings under the Residential Tenancies Act.

The court addressed a procedural "chicken and egg" problem: TCHC needed information about the youth proceedings to determine which statutory test applied for access, but could not access records without first establishing the applicable test.

The court adopted a bifurcated approach, initially obtaining and reviewing the Information to provide counsel with necessary details.

The court also addressed the novel issue of whether notice should be given to the young person despite no statutory requirement under section 119(1)(s)(ii) of the Youth Criminal Justice Act, finding that notice was desirable in the interests of justice given the serious consequences of potential eviction and the rehabilitative purposes of youth justice legislation.