ONTARIO COURT OF JUSTICE
NEWMARKET
BETWEEN:
HIS MAJESTY THE KING
— AND —
DA LIANG XUAN
RULING ON REASONABLE NOTICE s 742.6(5)
Heard and Delivered: June 4, 2026
Mr. Jeremy Mutton counsel for the Crown
Mr. Alexander Morris counsel for the defendant
KENKEL J.:
1On October 25, 2025, Mr. Xuan pleaded guilty to having a blood alcohol concentration in excess of the legal limit within two hours of operating a conveyance contrary to s 314(1)(b). He was sentenced to a 9-month conditional sentence with a house arrest condition and certain exceptions, a condition that he not operate a motor vehicle and a condition that he not occupy the driver’s seat of any motor vehicle. It is alleged that less that two months later on December 19, 2025, he was operating a vehicle that was involved in a crash and he failed to stop. He is charged with four Criminal Code offences and four Highway Traffic Act offences. He is before this court on allegations of four breaches of his conditional sentence arising from that incident.
2Section 742.6(4) requires that an allegation of breach be supported by a written report of the conditional sentence supervisor. Where the Crown gives the offender reasonable notice and a copy of the report, the report is admissible in evidence at the breach hearing. The Crown received a copy of the supervisor’s report in March, but the defence was not served with a copy until the day before this hearing. The defence submits that is not reasonable notice, so the Crown cannot rely upon the report as evidence.
3The Crown concedes late service. The supervisor’s report was not sent to the defence through inadvertence. This Crown had thought it had been disclosed. However, the supervisor’s report simply collates information about the alleged offences of December 19, 2025. That information was provided to the supervisor by the police and is attached to the one-page report. That same information about the alleged offences was otherwise disclosed to the defence well in advance of this hearing. The few paragraphs written by the supervisor contain no information relevant to the proof of the alleged breaches. In that context, the Crown submits that the notice given to the defence was reasonable despite the late service of the report.
4Reasonable notice is a concept, not a document. The Crown served the report as required under s 742.6(5). To rely on that report as evidence, the same subsection requires proof of reasonable notice. I agree with both parties that the service of the report was late. In many cases that would preclude the use of the report as evidence on the breach hearing or at the very least require an adjournment.
5Reasonable notice is essential to a fair hearing. It is important that the defendant responding party have full notice of the evidence on which the Crown is relying in a timely way so he can prepare his defence.
6This is an unusual case in that both parties agree the Crown has otherwise provided full disclosure of the evidence on which they are relying in this hearing. That was done well before the hearing. The defence is not taken by surprise.
7I find that the Crown has shown there was reasonable notice of the evidence in the supervisor’s report on which the Crown intends to rely and that evidence is admissible under s 746.2(5).
Delivered: June 4, 2026.
Justice Joseph F. Kenkel