Court of Appeal for Ontario

Date: 20241004 Docket: COA-23-CR-0843

Tulloch C.J.O., MacPherson and Monahan JJ.A.

BETWEEN

His Majesty the King Respondent

and

Churaman Ramgadoo Appellant

Counsel: Jeff Marshman, Edmond Brown, and Harsimratsingm Kharod, for the appellant Luke Schwalm, for the respondent

Heard: October 1, 2024

On appeal from the conviction entered by Justice James Stribopoulos of the Superior Court of Justice on January 24, 2022, with reasons reported at 2022 ONSC 507.

Reasons for Decision

[1] The appellant appeals from his conviction for second degree murder. On appeal, there is no dispute that the appellant unlawfully caused the death of the deceased, Ajay Chibber, and is therefore guilty of manslaughter. The sole issue on appeal is whether the trial judge provided sufficient reasons for his conclusion that the appellant intended to kill Mr. Chibber, or to at least cause him serious bodily harm that he knew was likely to cause his death.

[2] At the conclusion of the appellant’s submissions we indicated that it was not necessary to call upon the Crown and dismissed the appeal with reasons to follow. These are our reasons.

[3] The trial judge found that the appellant beat Mr. Chibber to death and then returned to his body and slit his throat with a knife. He found that the beating was especially brutal and that the appellant would have known the obvious consequences of such a beating that had the unmistakable markings of an attack that would kill. Given the brutality and manner of the attacks and the appellant’s act of returning to Mr. Chibber’s body and slitting his throat with a knife, the trial judge concluded that it was open for him to infer that when the appellant beat Mr. Chibber to death, he intended to kill him or cause him serious bodily harm likely to cause his death. The trial judge further found that, despite the appellant’s intoxication at the time, he retained the capacity to explain his motivation to his ex-wife over the phone and to remove evidence from the crime scene, which suggested that he could appreciate the somewhat obvious consequences of his attacks on Mr. Chibber.

[4] The appellant argues that the trial judge’s reasons were insufficient because he failed to explain why he rejected an alternative inference arising from the evidence which, he argues, is inconsistent with a finding of guilt on the charge of second-degree murder.

[5] This alternative inference is said to arise from the fact that the act of slitting Mr. Chibber’s throat did not in fact contribute to his death because, by that time, Mr. Chibber was already dead or very close to it. The appellant therefore argues that it is possible that he unintentionally caused Mr. Chibber’s death through the beating and only later attempted to murder him to evade detection by slitting his throat. On this view of the facts, although the appellant did have the mental state required for murder when slitting Mr. Chibber’s throat, he did not have that intent at the time when he actually caused Mr. Chibber’s death (i.e., during the beating) and thus could be found guilty of manslaughter but not murder. The appellant argues that the trial judge’s reasons were insufficient since he failed to explain why he rejected this alternative theory.

[6] We note that the trial judge was clearly alive to this alternative theory since it was the trial judge himself who raised it with counsel during closing submissions. The appellant called no evidence and made no arguments relating to this alternative theory, which is raised for the first time on appeal.

[7] In our view, when the reasons are read as a whole, there is no doubt as to why the trial judge found the appellant guilty of second-degree murder. While the trial judge did not expressly address the appellant’s alternative theory in his reasons, his findings of fact were sufficient to explain why he rejected it. In particular, as noted above, the trial judge found that the beating of Mr. Chibber was especially brutal and that, in administering such a beating, the appellant would have intended to kill Mr. Chibber or at the very least intended to cause him serious bodily harm that he knew was likely to cause death. It was only after establishing these findings of fact that the trial judge observed that the fact that the appellant returned to Mr. Chibber’s body to slit his throat with a knife left no possible room for doubt concerning his intentions.

[8] It was open to the trial judge to find that the beating was so brutal that it established beyond a reasonable doubt that the appellant intended to kill Mr. Chibber during the course of that beating, or at least to cause him bodily harm that he knew was likely to cause death. These findings are sufficient to rule out the appellant’s alternative theory, since that alternative theory is premised on the claim that the appellant did not intend to kill Mr. Chibber when he beat him to death.

[9] In considering the sufficiency of reasons, appellate courts must apply a functional test to determine whether the reasons provide an intelligible basis for understanding the trial judge’s verdict. The trial judge’s reasons in this case easily surpass that threshold.

[10] The appeal is therefore dismissed.

“M. Tulloch C.J.O.”

“J.C. MacPherson J.A.”

“P.J. Monahan J.A.”