CITATION: R. v. Brown, 2010 ONCA 753
DATE: 20101108
DOCKET: C48276
COURT OF APPEAL FOR ONTARIO
Doherty, Feldman and Gillese JJ.A.
BETWEEN
Her Majesty the Queen
Respondent
and
Vincent Delroy Brown
Appellant
Mark Halfyard, for the appellant
Milica Potrebic, for the respondent
Heard: November 5, 2010
On appeal from the conviction entered by Justice John R. Belleghem of the Superior Court of Justice dated June 10, 2006.
APPEAL BOOK ENDORSEMENT
[1] The appellant was convicted of conspiring to traffic cocaine and two counts of conspiracy to import cocaine. He appeals on two grounds: (1) the trial judge’s failure to provide a limiting instruction on the use the jury could make of bad character evidence adduced at trial; and (2) the sufficiency of the Vetrovec warning.
The Bad Character Evidence
[2] In this case, the defence made a tactical decision to put his bad character in issue. In fact, bad character evidence was a central aspect of the defence. Much of the evidence came from the sole defence witness or was elicited during cross-examination of the presentation witnesses.
[3] In the pre-charge discussion, defence counsel specifically asked the trial judge to not give such an instruction, at least in respect of part of the bad character evidence. Furthermore, defence counsel made no request for such an instruction nor did he raise an objection after the charge was given. Where defence counsel has made a tactical decision such as this, it cannot later complain about the lack of such an instruction.
The Vetrovec Warning
[4] In our view, the Vetrovec warning was sufficient to alert the jury to the danger of relying on the testimony of the three unsavoury Crown witnesses and the reasons for the need for caution.
[5] Accordingly, the appeal is dismissed.