COURT OF APPEAL FOR ONTARIO
ROSENBERG, LANG and ROULEAU JJ.A.
BETWEEN:
HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN
Respondent
and
MATTHEW SCOTT
Appellant
Paul Calarco for the appellant
Shelley Maria Hallett for the respondent
Heard and released orally: November 29, 2007
On appeal from sentence imposed by Justice David Watt of the Superior Court of Justice dated August 31, 2006.
ENDORSEMENT
Overview
1The appellant submits that the effective total sentence of eight years imprisonment does not reflect the appellant’s plea of guilty and his strong rehabilitative potential and indicates the trial judge must have given undue weight to the appellant’s record for similar offences. It is argued that this sentence was too big a jump from the appellant’s previous sentence. Finally, it is argued that imposing a sentence at the high end of the range was excessive.
Analysis
2We are satisfied that the sentence is fit and that the trial judge made no error in principle. The seriousness of these offences cannot be underestimated. The appellant attended a meeting to purchase firearms while he himself was armed with a gun loaded in part with hollow-point bullets. The consequences of these offences are not simply tragic they graphically demonstrate the consequences of possessing and trafficking in high end hand guns. At the time the appellant was on three firearms prohibition, had a prior conviction for breaching a firearms prohibition, and had a record for violating other court orders and numerous charges of assault.
3We agree with the trial judge’s reasons and his application of the principles of sentence to these offences and to this offender. And in particular, as the trial judge said, “setting to one side what actually occurred, weapons are loaded for a single purpose use, and carried by those whom it is reasonable to infer are prepared to use them. Mathew Scott took a fully loaded firearm in a motor vehicle into a parking lot in a residential area on a mid-September evening. The prospect of disaster of injury or death to persons was palpable”.
Disposition
4Accordingly, while leave to appeal sentence is granted, the appeal is dismissed.
Signed: “M. Rosenberg J.A.”
“S.E. Lang J.A.”
“Paul Rouleau J.A.”
