COURT OF APPEAL FOR ONTARIO
LASKIN, FELDMAN AND ARMSTRONG JJ.A.
B E T W E E N :
HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN
Feroza Bhabha and Julie Zamprogna for the respondent
Respondent
Anita Szigeti Amicus curiae
- and -
BRIAN STANLEY
Brian Harold Stanley In person
Appellant
Heard: September 15, 2005
On appeal from the disposition of the Ontario Review Board dated February 1, 2005.
BY THE COURT:
1Brian Stanley appeals the disposition made by the Ontario Review Board on February 1, 2005. The background facts that led to Mr. Stanley’s detention are summarized in the Board’s reasons. It is unnecessary to repeat those facts here.
2Under the Board’s disposition, Mr. Stanley was ordered to be detained at the minimum secure unit of the Regional Mental Health Care St. Thomas, St. Joseph’s Health Care London. However, the disposition also ordered that the hospital person in charge create a program for Mr. Stanley that would permit him to do the following:
- attend within or outside of the hospital for necessary medical, dental or compassionate purposes;
- enter Elgin County for attendance at work while being indirectly supervised;
- enter Southern Ontario for socialization, also while being indirectly supervised; and
- live in Elgin County in supervised accommodation approved by the person in charge.
3In this court, Mr. Stanley sought a conditional discharge coupled with a mandatory medication order to which he would consent under s. 672.55 of the Criminal Code. That was not the position he took before the Board.
4Before the Board, Mr. Stanley sought an absolute discharge. In rejecting this relief, the Board relied on the evidence of his attending psychiatrist that Mr. Stanley
- continues to be a threat to the safety of the public;
- suffers from a major mental illness of paranoid schizophrenia and from alcohol abuse;
- does not believe he has an illness;
- takes his medication solely because he is told to do so; and
- if left to his own devices, would not take this medication, thus making it likely he would suffer a relapse and become a danger to the public.
5In the light of these findings, the Board considered continuing the detention order with the ameliorating provisions we have outlined to be the least onerous and least restrictive disposition for Mr. Stanley.
6Mr. Stanley’s failure to ask the Board for a conditional discharge does not preclude this court from granting him that relief. We recognize an important practical difference between a conditional discharge and the order made by the Board: under the former, Mr. Stanley chooses his own living space in the community, while under the latter, the hospital person in charge must approve where he lives. However, given the findings of the Board, which in our view are reasonably supported by the evidence, we are of the opinion that the Board’s disposition order is appropriate. See R. v. Owen (2003), 2003 SCC 33, 174 C.C.C. (3d) 1 (S.C.C.).
7The evidence of Mr. Stanley’s psychiatrist shows that Mr. Stanley has continually and over a long period of time, refused to acknowledge that he has a mental illness, denied that he requires medical treatment and demonstrated an unwillingness to take prescribed medications. Although as a term of a conditional discharge he is now prepared to consent to an order that he take his medication, we think that a conditional discharge would be an impractical disposition. Until Mr. Stanley demonstrates that he is prepared to comply voluntarily with prescribed treatment, we see no reason to interfere with the Board’s disposition. That disposition does allow Mr. Stanley the opportunity to begin reintegrating himself into the community. We assume that if he shows an ability to live responsibly in the community, the Board will consider further easing the restrictions on his liberty in subsequent dispositions.
8The appeal is dismissed.
RELEASED: “J.L.” March 23, 2006
“J.I. Laskin J.A.”
“K.N. Feldman J.A.”
“R.P. Armstrong J.A.”