Nadia Thomas

The appellant appealed a restitution order imposed by the sentencing judge on his own motion without advance notice.

The Court of Appeal found that the sentencing judge failed to conduct an adequate inquiry into the appellant's ability to pay, noting a lack of evidence regarding his expenses and income.

Given that the appellant had already served his conditional sentence and probation, and had paid over $10,000 in restitution despite only receiving $5,000 from the fraud, the appeal was allowed and the restitution order was reduced to the amount already paid.

The appellant appealed his robbery conviction, arguing that the verdict was unreasonable due to weak identification evidence.

The victim gave a generic description of the assailant and could not identify the imitation gun found on the appellant upon his arrest.

The only identification evidence was an in-court identification, which the Crown conceded had virtually no evidentiary value.

The Court of Appeal agreed that the verdict was unreasonable, quashed the conviction, and entered an acquittal.

The Crown appealed the accused's acquittals on charges of sexual abuse, arguing the trial judge erred in excluding similar fact evidence, excluding a decision of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, and permitting cross-examination on prior complaints.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding the trial judge correctly applied the test for concoction regarding the similar fact evidence, properly exercised his discretion to exclude the College decision due to prejudicial effect, and appropriately instructed the jury on the use of prior complaints for assessing credibility.

The appellant appealed an Ontario Review Board disposition granting the respondent an absolute discharge.

The respondent had been found not guilty of second-degree murder by reason of insanity in 1983.

The Board concluded the respondent posed a minimal risk to the public, relying partly on his attending psychiatrist's belief that he would continue his relationship with the hospital.

On appeal, the appellant sought to introduce fresh evidence showing that the respondent severed his relationship with the psychiatrist following the absolute discharge.

The Court of Appeal admitted the fresh evidence, finding it undermined a central premise of the Board's reasoning, and ordered a new hearing.

The appellant appealed his conviction and 17-month sentence for sexual offences against a young complainant.

He argued the trial judge erred in relying on certain evidence as confirmatory of the complainant's testimony.

The Court of Appeal found that while one item of confirmatory evidence was improperly considered, the error was harmless and the verdict would have been the same.

The conviction appeal was dismissed.

However, the sentence appeal was allowed, and the custodial sentence was reduced from 17 months to 12 months, as the original sentence exceeded the range for similar circumstances.

The appellant appealed his conviction, arguing the trial judge erred by failing to give the jury a blended instruction on self-defence and accident.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding the trial judge's functional approach properly focused the jury on whether the stabbing was accidental.

The court noted that if the stabbing was purposeful, self-defence would have lacked an air of reality.

The appeal from sentence was dismissed as abandoned.

The young person appealed their conviction and sentence.

The sentence appeal was abandoned.

On the conviction appeal, the appellant argued the trial judge erred in assessing identification evidence and the appellant's failure to testify.

The Court of Appeal found that while the trial judge's reasons were brief, it was open to him to accept the identification evidence, which included specific details about the assailant's glasses and braces.

The court also noted that while the trial judge could not use the appellant's failure to testify to make the Crown's case, he was nonetheless satisfied of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

The appeal was dismissed.

The appellant appealed his conviction for the sexual assault of his stepdaughter.

At trial, the Crown called a clinical and forensic psychologist to address frailties in the complainant's evidence, including delayed disclosure and memory issues.

The trial judge relied heavily on this expert opinion to find the complainant credible.

However, the tape of the expert's cross-examination was lost before it could be transcribed.

The Court of Appeal held that the missing transcript prevented a proper assessment of whether the trial judge erred in her use of the expert evidence, raising serious concerns about the safety of the verdict.

The appeal was allowed and a new trial ordered.

The appellants were convicted of first-degree murder, conspiracy to murder, and possession of explosives in relation to a contract killing.

The Crown's case relied heavily on the testimony of an unsavoury witness who had pleaded guilty to manslaughter in exchange for his testimony.

The appellants appealed their convictions on multiple grounds, primarily focusing on errors in the trial judge's charge to the jury.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal and ordered a new trial, finding that the trial judge failed to give an adequate Vetrovec warning regarding the unsavoury Crown witnesses, improperly gave a Vetrovec-like warning regarding a defence witness, and failed to instruct the jury properly on a hearsay statement.

The appellant appealed his jury convictions for a convenience store robbery and possession of a stolen vehicle, arguing the verdicts were unreasonable.

The Crown's case relied on circumstantial evidence linking the appellant to the stolen getaway vehicle days prior to the robbery, and speculative theories regarding his knowledge of the store's panic button and a knife used in the robbery.

Exculpatory evidence included DNA from masks that did not match the appellant and an eyewitness description of the getaway driver's hair colour that did not match the appellant's red hair.

The Court of Appeal found the evidence too tenuous to support an inference of guilt and concluded the verdicts were unreasonable.

The appeal was allowed and acquittals were entered.

The appellants were convicted of attempted murder and robbery following a home invasion where a 72-year-old victim was severely beaten and left bound.

They appealed their convictions, arguing the trial judge erred in instructing the jury on aiding and abetting, and by omitting the D.W. instruction from written materials provided to the jury.

One appellant also appealed his sentence.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeals, finding the jury instructions were adequate in context, the verdicts were reasonable, and the 13-year sentence was fit given the viciousness of the crime and the intent to kill.

The appellant was convicted of aggravated assault and related charges following a stabbing outside a nightclub.

She appealed on the grounds that the trial judge misdirected the jury on the use of a co-accused's statement, failed to adequately instruct on eyewitness identification frailties, and erred in his handling of trial exhibits that went missing during jury deliberations.

The Court of Appeal found that the trial judge committed a reversible error by instructing the jury that the co-accused's statement could be used as evidence for all accused.

The court also found errors in the identification and missing exhibits instructions.

The appeal was allowed and a new trial ordered.

The appellant appealed his conviction for two counts of sexual touching of the young complainant, arguing the trial judge misapprehended the evidence.

The Crown appealed the conditional sentence of two years less a day imposed at trial.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal, finding no misapprehension of evidence, particularly given the presence of the appellant's semen on the complainant's bed sheets.

The Court allowed the Crown's sentence appeal, finding the trial judge erred in principle by imposing a conditional sentence for sexual abuse of a child in his care, and substituted a sentence of 12 months' incarceration.

The appellant appealed the sentence imposed by the Ontario Court of Justice.

The Court of Appeal found no error in principle and held that the sentence was not unfit given the appellant's criminal record.

The appeal was dismissed.

The appellant appealed his convictions for assault, harassment, and threatening his wife.

He argued the trial judge erred in applying the W.D. test, assessing credibility due to interpreter issues, and failing to address inconsistencies and good character evidence.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding the trial judge's reasons were sufficient and demonstrated no error in assessing credibility or applying the burden of proof.

The appellant appealed a decision of the Summary Conviction Appeal Court that had overturned his acquittal.

The Court of Appeal found that the summary conviction appeal judge erred in concluding the trial judge improperly treated the arresting officer's notes as evidence or required them to confirm oral testimony.

The trial judge properly used the absence of an important fact in the notes regarding the origin of the odour of alcohol to assess the officer's credibility.

The trial judge's finding of reasonable doubt regarding the officer's reasonable suspicion was restored.

The young person appealed his conviction and sentence for sexual assault.

The conviction appeal was based on a reasonable apprehension of bias, as the trial judge had accepted a guilty plea from a co-accused six weeks prior to the appellant's trial, during which facts implicating the appellant were read in.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal, finding no reasonable apprehension of bias, noting that trial judges routinely disabuse their minds of potentially prejudicial information from prior proceedings.

The sentence appeal was also dismissed, as the court found no error in the sentence imposed and noted the appellant had almost completed the secure custody portion.

The Crown appealed a summary conviction appeal court's order requiring it to pay $12,000 in costs to the respondent.

The respondent had successfully avoided a minimum jail sentence for impaired driving after the summary conviction appeal court stayed the sentence, despite finding the minimum penalty provision constitutional.

The summary conviction appeal court awarded costs against the Crown, characterizing the appeal as a test case.

The Court of Appeal allowed the Crown's appeal and set aside the costs order, finding that the appeal was not a test case as the respondent had a vital personal interest in avoiding incarceration, and there was no Crown misconduct to justify the award.

The appellant appealed his conviction and sentence.

He argued the trial judge erred in assessing the credibility of an accomplice's evidence.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal, finding that the trial judge properly instructed himself on the danger of accepting accomplice evidence and that the confirmatory evidence was overwhelming.

The sentence appeal was dismissed as abandoned.

The appellant, a young person, appealed his conviction and sentence for sexual assault.

He argued a reasonable apprehension of bias because the trial judge had accepted a guilty plea from his co-accused six weeks prior to his trial, during which facts implicating the appellant were read in.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal, noting the high threshold for reasonable apprehension of bias and that trial judges routinely disabuse their minds of prior prejudicial information.

The sentence appeal was allowed in part to quash a sentence for breach of probation, as the appellant was not convicted of that charge, but the sentence for sexual assault was upheld.