Court of Appeal for Ontario

Date: 2025-05-15
Docket: COA-23-CR-1054

Before: Michal Fairburn, John C. MacPherson, Eileen E. Gillese

Between:
His Majesty the King (Respondent)
and
Garett Roy (Appellant)

Appearances:
Mark C. Halfyard, for the appellant
Baaba Forson, for the respondent

Heard and released orally: 2025-05-13

On appeal from the convictions entered by Justice John R. Sproat of the Superior Court of Justice, dated July 17, 2023.

Reasons for Decision

[1] This is an appeal from convictions for three counts of sexual assault.

[2] The appellant and complainant lived together and were involved in an intimate relationship. After she became pregnant, she started suffering from significant health issues and moved back into her parents’ home. After the baby was born, the appellant sought access. In the context of that family proceeding, the appellant filed material referencing his research on what he believed to be a remedy for pregnancy-related illness – one that involved a sexual act.

[3] The complainant said that the appellant’s reference to this remedy during the family proceedings prompted her report to the police of three alleged sexual assaults – one occurring while she lived with the appellant, and the other two from when she was living in her parents’ home.

[4] The trial judge provided considered reasons. He outlined his credibility findings explaining why he accepted the complainant’s credibility and rejected that of the appellant.

[5] The appellant maintains that the trial judge erred in two respects.

[6] First, he is said to have engaged in circular reasoning, discounting inconsistencies in the complainant’s evidence based on the trauma she had experienced from the alleged sexual assaults. On this basis, the trial judge is said to have reversed the burden of proof.

[7] We do not read the trial judge’s reasons as circular in nature. When the reasons are read in their proper context, the trial judge’s reference to the complainant’s trauma does not reflect a presumption that the criminal acts occurred. Rather, the trial judge was referring to the trauma arising from the complainant’s medical condition during her first pregnancy, which the trial judge said was “extremely debilitating and a threat to her wellbeing and that of her child.”

[8] Second, the appellant argues that the trial judge materially misapprehended the evidence about a discussion involving the appellant paying rent while living at the complainant’s parents’ home. We do not see this as a material inconsistency. In any event, no rent was ever paid.

[9] For these reasons, the appeal is dismissed.

“Michal Fairburn”
“John C. MacPherson”
“Eileen E. Gillese”