Richard Kramer

The applicant, convicted of first-degree murder and unsuccessful on appeal to the Court of Appeal, sought a declaration that he was not required to seek leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada before applying for ministerial review of his conviction under s. 696.1 of the Criminal Code.

The Attorney General of Ontario argued that all appeal avenues, including a leave application to the Supreme Court, must be exhausted before ministerial review could proceed.

The court held that although the phrase “rights of judicial review or appeal” includes the right to seek leave to appeal to the Supreme Court, the concept of exhaustion must be interpreted flexibly.

Determining whether appeal rights have been exhausted is a discretionary screening decision for the Minister of Justice, not the provincial Attorney General.

The court declared that the Minister may determine that appeal rights are exhausted even where no leave application to the Supreme Court has been made.

The United States sought the extradition of the applicant for child pornography offences.

The applicant brought a Charter application to exclude evidence seized during a search of his residence by Canadian police.

The court found that the search warrant was invalid as the information to obtain lacked reasonable grounds to believe evidence would be found at the new address.

Furthermore, the manner of the search was highly unreasonable, involving an unnecessary dynamic entry with flash grenades, gratuitous damage to the home, and the arbitrary detention and mistreatment of the occupants, including the applicant.

The court concluded that the police conduct flagrantly breached sections 8, 9, and 10(b) of the Charter.

Applying the Grant framework, the court excluded all evidence seized during the search under section 24(2) of the Charter.