Peter Lindsay

The accused was charged with impaired driving, driving over 80, and failing to comply with a recognizance.

The fail to comply charge was dismissed on a directed verdict.

The court found that police breached the accused's s. 10(b) Charter rights by failing to clarify his right to counsel when he showed obvious confusion, and by failing to facilitate contact with counsel of his choice.

Consequently, the breath test results were excluded under s. 24(2) and the over 80 charge was dismissed.

However, based on the officers' observations of the accused at the scene, including being slumped over the wheel, unsteadiness, and a strong odour of alcohol, the court found the accused guilty of impaired driving.

The defendant was stopped for speeding and subsequently investigated for drinking and driving.

He failed a roadside screening test and later provided breath samples over the legal limit.

At trial, the defendant sought to exclude the breath test results under s. 24(2) of the Charter, alleging breaches of his ss. 7, 8, 9, and 10(b) rights due to a delay in administering the roadside test and police allegedly steering him to duty counsel.

The court dismissed the Charter applications, finding no breaches, and entered a finding of guilt for operating a motor vehicle with a blood alcohol concentration over 80mg.

The appellant sought leave to appeal from a summary conviction appeal dismissal.

The appellant had been acquitted of impaired driving but convicted of refusal to provide a breath sample.

The appellant argued the conviction was unreasonable based on inconsistency with the acquittal, misapprehension of expert evidence, and the trial judge's independent research.

The Court of Appeal found no error by the summary conviction appeal judge and dismissed the application for leave to appeal, holding that the proposed appeal did not meet the test for leave as it raised no legal issues of significance to the general administration of justice.

The appellant appealed his conviction for driving "Over 80" arguing the trial judge misapprehended expert toxicology evidence regarding the possibility of a rising blood-alcohol concentration (BAC) curve.

The expert testified that a hypothetical scenario where BAC was below 80 mg at the time of driving but rose to 90 mg by the time of testing was possible, though unlikely.

The Superior Court dismissed the appeal, finding that the trial judge accurately apprehended the expert's evidence and was not left with reasonable doubt, correctly viewing the hypothetical as a mere possibility not tied to the specific evidence of the appellant.

The appellant appealed his conviction for operating a motor vehicle with more than 80 milligrams of alcohol in 100 millilitres of blood.

He contended that the arresting officer violated his Charter rights by failing to consider whether residual mouth alcohol could have distorted the accuracy of the approved screening device (ASD) test result.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, holding that while officers should consider residual mouth alcohol as a matter of good practice, the failure to do so does not constitute a Charter violation.

The court found that the officer had reasonable grounds to arrest and make an evidential breath demand based on the information available to her at the time.

The appellant appealed his convictions for impaired driving and driving with a blood alcohol content over 80 mg.

He argued the trial judge erred in finding impairment by alcohol, relying on the toxicologist's evidence, and dismissing his Charter applications under sections 8, 9, and 10(b).

The Superior Court of Justice found no errors in the trial judge's assessment of the evidence or her Charter rulings, concluding that the appellant was not detained prior to arrest and that the breath demand was made as soon as practicable.

The appeal was dismissed.

The defendant was charged with impaired driving after being stopped for speeding.

The Crown relied on blood alcohol test results showing readings of 96 and 95 milligrams of alcohol per 100 millilitres of blood, taken approximately three hours after the defendant was stopped.

A toxicologist provided expert evidence that the defendant's blood alcohol level at the time of driving exceeded 80 milligrams per 100 millilitres of blood.

The defendant challenged the toxicologist's assumptions regarding elimination rates, plateau periods, breath-to-blood conversion ratios, and other factors.

The court found that while the defence raised hypothetical scenarios that could theoretically affect the calculations, there was insufficient case-specific evidence to create a reasonable doubt about the Crown's case.

The defendant was found guilty.

The appellant appealed his conviction for 'over 80 care or control' after his vehicle went into a ditch and he was found in the driver's seat waiting for a tow truck.

The trial judge found the appellant guilty based on the presumption of care or control under s. 258(1)(a) of the Criminal Code, but failed to properly consider whether the appellant had rebutted the presumption by exiting and re-entering the vehicle with a change of intention.

The Superior Court of Justice found the trial judge erred in law by basing the conviction on an un-rebutted presumption while simultaneously analyzing the risk of danger as if the presumption had been rebutted.

The appeal was allowed, the conviction set aside, and a new trial ordered.

The appellant challenged an impaired driving conviction on the basis that the trial judge improperly shifted the burden by requiring defence evidence for innocent explanations and wrongly relied on inconsistent civilian testimony.

The appeal court held that innocent explanations may arise from the absence of evidence, but only where they are reasonable in light of logic, experience, and the record as a whole.

The court found no misapprehension of the evidence and no basis to interfere with the trial judge’s weighing of competing inferences or credibility findings.

The civilian evidence, though inconsistent in some respects, remained probative on central issues and was corroborated by the attending officer and surrounding circumstances.

The appeal was dismissed.

The appellant appealed her summary conviction for impaired driving and driving over 80.

At trial, the Crown relied on a toxicologist's report that assumed the appellant had not engaged in bolus drinking within 15 minutes prior to the incident.

The trial judge found sufficient circumstantial evidence to disprove bolus drinking and convicted the appellant.

On appeal, the appellant argued the trial judge misapprehended the evidence and reversed the burden of proof.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the appeal, finding no palpable and overriding error in the trial judge's factual inferences regarding the absence of bolus drinking.

The appellant was convicted of two counts of fraud over $5,000 relating to small business loans obtained under Industry Canada's Small Business Loan Program.

The loans were fraudulently obtained for purposes other than those specified in the program requirements.

The sole issue at trial was whether the appellant, a professional loan broker, knowingly participated in the frauds.

The trial judge found the appellant guilty on both counts and imposed a 90-day intermittent sentence on the first count followed by a consecutive 12-month conditional sentence on the second count.

The appellant appealed both conviction and sentence, raising arguments regarding misapprehension of evidence, credibility analysis, and burden of proof, as well as seeking leave to appeal the sentence on parity grounds.

The Crown sought to admit surveillance video evidence of an incident involving the accused, who was charged with care or control of a vehicle while impaired by alcohol.

The defence objected to the admissibility of the video on the grounds that no representative from the business that maintained the surveillance system was called to authenticate the copy, and that there was no evidence the video had not been altered.

The court ruled the video admissible, finding that circumstantial evidence and corroborating testimony from police officers and in-car videos established the accuracy and integrity of the surveillance recording on a balance of probabilities.

The defendant was charged with impaired driving and driving with excess blood alcohol following a collision at a gas station.

The Crown's case relied on observations of impairment before and after arrest, breath sample analysis, and toxicological evidence.

The defendant raised multiple Charter applications challenging the lawfulness of the arrest, the demand for breath samples, interpretation services, and the right to counsel.

The court found the defendant guilty on both counts after rejecting all Charter challenges and finding compelling evidence of impairment based on the totality of circumstances.

The defendant was charged with operating a motor vehicle with a blood alcohol concentration exceeding the legal limit (Count 1) and impaired driving (Count 2).

The Crown's case was based on observations of erratic driving by civilian witnesses, police observations of indicia of impairment, and breath test results showing 170 mg/100 ml and 160 mg/100 ml.

The court dismissed Count 1 because the Crown failed to prove that the breath samples were received directly into the approved instrument as required by s. 258(1)(c)(iii) of the Criminal Code.

The court found the defendant guilty on Count 2 based on the cumulative circumstantial evidence of impairment, including the protracted period of dangerous driving, physical indicia of intoxication, and the defendant's demeanor and confusion.

The accused was charged with operating a motor vehicle with a blood alcohol concentration exceeding 80 milligrams of alcohol in 100 millilitres of blood.

The Crown sought to rely on breath sample analysis from an approved instrument.

The accused challenged the admissibility of the evidence on Charter grounds, arguing violations of sections 8 and 9 regarding the roadside screening demand, the reliability of the screening device results, the detention in the police cruiser, and the timing of the breath samples.

The court found no Charter violations and admitted the evidence, finding the accused guilty as charged.

The appellant was convicted of operating a motor vehicle with a blood alcohol concentration over the legal limit.

The appeal challenged the trial judge's findings that breath samples were taken "as soon as practicable" despite delays caused by a new police booking system (Versadex) and the dismissal of a Charter application regarding the grounds for a breath demand, specifically concerning mouth alcohol.

The court dismissed the appeal, finding that the trial judge applied the correct legal tests for "as soon as practicable" and for the officer's reasonable belief in the accuracy of the Approved Screening Device (ASD) test.

The accused was acquitted of impaired driving but convicted of refusing to provide a breath sample at trial.

Both the Crown and the accused appealed.

The accused argued the verdicts were inconsistent and the trial judge misapprehended expert evidence regarding the synergistic effects of Ativan and alcohol.

The Crown argued the trial judge erred in law by finding the accused lacked the mens rea for impaired driving due to the unanticipated effects of combining alcohol and prescription medication.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed both appeals, finding no inconsistency in the verdicts, no material misapprehension of evidence, and holding that the presumption of voluntariness for impaired driving can be rebutted where impairment results from the unforeseeable combined effect of alcohol and drugs.

The applicant sought leave to appeal a summary conviction appeal court decision that set aside his acquittal for operating a motor vehicle with a prohibited blood alcohol concentration and ordered a new trial.

The trial judge had acquitted the applicant after finding that a 13-month delay in inspecting the Intoxilyzer meant it was 'operated improperly', defeating the statutory presumption of identity.

The summary conviction appeal court found this was an error of law.

The Court of Appeal refused leave to appeal, noting that second appeals in summary conviction proceedings are exceptional, the proposed ground involved well-settled law, and the substantive issue was already controlled by Supreme Court jurisprudence.

The accused was charged with driving with over 80 mg of alcohol in 100 ml of blood following a RIDE program stop.

The Crown did not dispute the accuracy of the breathalyzer readings but argued they should be admitted despite Charter breaches.

The court found two Charter violations: a section 10(b) breach due to failure to explain rights in the accused's language (Cantonese), and a section 8 breach due to the officer's failure to follow OPP protocol regarding potential sources of false positives on the approved screening device.

Applying the section 24(2) test, the court excluded the evidence and acquitted the accused.

The accused was charged with impaired driving after being stopped by police and failing an approved screening device test.

The trial addressed multiple Charter issues: whether grounds existed for further testing despite the presence of mouthwash in the vehicle, whether the initial stop was arbitrary, and whether the accused's right to counsel was breached.

The court found no breach of sections 8 or 9 of the Charter, but found multiple breaches of section 10(b) when police failed to provide a reasonable opportunity to speak with counsel of choice and made comments discouraging the exercise of that right.

The evidence was excluded under section 24(2) and the charge was dismissed.