M. Savard

The appellant appealed his conviction for sexual assault, arguing the trial judge erred in admitting text messages sent by the complainant during the alleged assault for the truth of their contents under the spontaneous utterance exception to the hearsay rule.

The Superior Court of Justice allowed the appeal, finding that the common law exception for spontaneous utterances should be modified to require the party seeking admission to prove necessity when the declarant testifies at trial.

The court held that the text messages were improperly admitted for their truth as they lacked necessity and sufficient indicia of reliability, and the trial judge improperly used them to corroborate the complainant's credibility.

A new trial was ordered.

Accused charged with bribery of foreign public officials sought production of investigative records from the World Bank’s Integrity Vice Presidency in support of a Garofoli challenge to wiretap authorizations.

The World Bank asserted immunity as an international organization and refused to produce additional materials.

The court held that by initiating and actively assisting the Canadian criminal investigation, the organization had impliedly waived immunity and must accept the procedural burdens of a criminal prosecution.

The applicants established likely relevance under the first stage of the O’Connor framework.

Production was ordered for certain investigative materials for judicial review.

The Crown appealed a trial acquittal on a charge of sexual assault, arguing the trial judge erred by failing to properly consider the complainant’s evidence, by finding no sexual assault occurred, and by providing insufficient reasons.

The appeal court examined whether the trial judge correctly applied the credibility framework in R. v. W.(D.) and whether the reasons for acquittal were legally sufficient.

The court held that, read as a whole, the trial judge’s analysis demonstrated reliance on the second branch of the W.(D.) framework and properly rejected the complainant’s evidence as unreliable.

The reasons sufficiently explained the basis for reasonable doubt and did not disclose a reversible error of law.

The acquittal was therefore upheld.