P. Keen

The Crown applied to have the young person sentenced as an adult after she pleaded guilty to being an accessory after the fact to murder, uttering threats, and breaching a detention order.

The young person was 16 years old when she repeatedly lied to police to protect the perpetrators of a brutal murder and dismemberment.

The court found that the Crown failed to rebut the presumption of diminished moral blameworthiness, noting the young person's vulnerability, mental health struggles, and adolescent immaturity at the time of the offence.

The application for an adult sentence was dismissed, and the young person was sentenced to 18 months of secure custody followed by 9 months of supervision, taking into account 19.5 months of pre-sentence custody.

The 18-year-old Indigenous offender was convicted of two counts of second-degree murder and one count of attempted murder after shooting his father and best friend while intoxicated.

The court accepted a joint submission for a life sentence with no parole eligibility for 18 years for the murders, and a concurrent 10-year sentence for the attempted murder.

The court heavily weighed Gladue factors, the offender's youth, lack of prior record, and expressions of remorse, balancing them against the devastating impact on the remote First Nation community.

The accused was charged with first-degree murder, attempted murder, and assault following a shooting in a remote First Nation community that left his father and friend dead.

The Crown conceded first-degree murder could not be proven, and the accused argued his advanced intoxication negated the specific intent for second-degree murder.

The court found that despite his intoxication, the accused's actions and statements demonstrated he had the requisite intent for second-degree murder.

The court also found his actions in searching for the surviving witness with a loaded firearm went beyond mere preparation, resulting in a conviction for attempted murder.

The accused, an Indigenous man with significant health issues including kidney failure, pleaded guilty to defrauding an Aboriginal Health Access Centre of $59,901.70 while serving as its Treasurer.

The court considered Gladue factors, the accused's health, and the devastating impact of the fraud on the organization.

A 12-month conditional sentence was imposed, followed by two years of probation, along with orders for full restitution and a lifetime prohibition from holding positions of financial authority.

The accused was charged with aggravated assault after the victim suffered a severe stab wound to the arm during a gathering.

The Crown's case relied heavily on the victim's testimony, which the court found unreliable due to his high level of intoxication and admission of giving false evidence.

Relying instead on the testimony of another witness present, the court concluded it could not exclude the reasonable possibility that the stabbing was accidental.

The accused was found not guilty.

The Crown appealed the accused's acquittal on charges of impaired driving and operating a motor vehicle with a blood alcohol concentration over the legal limit.

At trial, the accused successfully raised the defence of non-mental disorder automatism, specifically dissociative fugue.

The summary conviction appeal court found that the trial judge erred in law by requiring the Crown to disprove the automatism defence beyond a reasonable doubt, rather than requiring the accused to prove it on a balance of probabilities.

The appeal was allowed, the acquittal was overturned, and a conviction was entered for impaired driving, with a stay on the over 80 charge.

The accused was charged with aggravated sexual assault, sexual assault causing bodily harm, and attempting to choke, suffocate, or strangle the complainant during a sexual assault.

The case turned on credibility between the complainant and the accused.

The court applied the framework from R. v. W.(D.) and rejected the accused’s account as internally and externally inconsistent and incompatible with the medical evidence.

Extensive medical and expert evidence established severe strangulation injuries, including ligature marks, petechiae, and subconjunctival hemorrhaging, consistent with the complainant’s testimony that she was strangled while sexually assaulted.

The court found the complainant credible and concluded beyond a reasonable doubt that the accused committed aggravated sexual assault that endangered her life.

The appellant appealed a summary conviction for assaulting a peace officer contrary to s. 270(1)(a) of the Criminal Code.

The appeal challenged findings that the police officer had been invited into the residence, had no legal obligation to state the purpose of attendance before entry, and was lawfully executing his duties when arresting individuals for trespassing.

The appellant also argued that the Trespass to Property Act did not apply on reserve lands and that the officer’s authority ended once consent to remain was withdrawn.

The court held that the officer had been invited into the home, that no legal requirement existed to disclose the purpose of attendance before entry, and that the Trespass to Property Act applied as provincial legislation of general application.

Finding no palpable and overriding error or legal error, the court dismissed the appeal.

During a homicide trial, the Crown brought an application under s. 9(2) of the Canada Evidence Act to cross-examine a witness on a prior videotaped statement to police after she claimed to have no memory of the events or the statement.

The Crown also sought to admit the statement for the truth of its contents under the principled approach to hearsay.

The court found that despite the lack of an oath and the witness's intoxication, the videotaped nature of the statement and the opportunity for cross-examination provided sufficient threshold reliability.

The statement was admitted into evidence.

Mid-trial, the co-accused obtained new counsel and pled guilty to manslaughter, agreeing to provide a statement and potentially testify against the applicant.

The applicant sought a mistrial, arguing the Crown's acceptance of the plea was a strategic abuse of process to secure testimony and that the new statement constituted late disclosure prejudicing his defence.

The court dismissed the application, finding no abuse of process in the Crown's plea negotiations and concluding that the applicant's ability to cross-examine the co-accused mitigated any prejudice from the late disclosure.

A mistrial was not necessary to prevent a miscarriage of justice.