Robert F. Goldstein

The defendants sought leave to add the Estate of Gabriel Zimmerman as a party, direct payment of withheld rental income into court, and be released from liability.

The plaintiffs opposed, arguing the estate's claim was statute-barred.

The court dismissed the motion, finding the estate's claim was subject to the two-year limitation period under the Limitations Act, which had expired, and that the Trustee Act did not apply to extend the period.

The court also declined to apply the Doctrine of Special Circumstances, noting the claim had been known for years without compelling explanation for inaction.

The accused was charged with firearms offences after police found a handgun in a plastic bag during a "wellness check" in a residential building stairwell.

The accused brought a Charter application to exclude the evidence, arguing the search violated his s. 8 rights.

The court found the accused had a reasonable expectation of privacy in the bag and that the police lacked reasonable suspicion for an investigative detention or grounds for an arrest under the Trespass to Property Act.

Finding that the officers fabricated an after-the-fact justification for the search and were not forthright with the court, the judge excluded the firearm under s. 24(2) of the Charter, leading to the dismissal of the charges.

The applicant, charged with drug trafficking, brought a section 8 Charter application to exclude evidence seized pursuant to a search warrant.

The applicant argued that the police fabricated the existence of a confidential informant or the information provided, and that the information was absurd and uncorroborated.

The court dismissed the application, finding that the information provided by the confidential informant was compelling, credible, and strongly corroborated by police investigation, providing a sufficient basis for the issuing judge to grant the warrant.

The offender was convicted of possession of cocaine for the purpose of trafficking after police seized 188.72 grams of powder cocaine and 20.75 grams of crack cocaine from his apartment.

The Crown sought a penitentiary sentence of 3 to 3.5 years, while the defence argued for a non-custodial sentence, citing exceptional circumstances and case law on addict traffickers.

The court rejected the defence's argument, finding no evidence the offender was an addict and concluding he was a commercial trafficker.

However, emphasizing rehabilitation for a youthful first offender, the court sentenced him to two years less a day in reformatory and two years of probation.

The accused was tried for possession of stolen property after attempting to sell a gold bar that was allegedly the proceeds of a fraud.

The Crown's case relied entirely on circumstantial evidence, including cell phone tower data and the accused's familial and business connections to the perpetrators of the fraud.

The court found beyond a reasonable doubt that the gold was obtained by crime.

However, the court was left with a reasonable doubt regarding whether the accused had actual knowledge of the fraud or was wilfully blind to it, citing issues with the reliability of key witness testimony.

The charge was dismissed.

The moving parties brought a motion for contempt against the responding party, a judgment debtor, for failing to answer written interrogatories.

The court previously found the responding party in contempt and adjourned sentencing to allow him to purge.

The court found that the responding party's subsequent answers were inadequate, obfuscating, and failed to provide key financial information, rejecting his claims that poor health prevented compliance.

As a penalty, the court prohibited the responding party from taking any steps in this or related litigation until the contempt is purged.

The appellant appealed his convictions for intimidation, assault, and sexual assault, arguing that the trial judge misapprehended defence evidence and rendered inconsistent verdicts by acquitting him on one count of sexual assault while convicting on others.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the appeal, finding that the trial judge's assessment of the defence witness's credibility was justified and did not misapprehend the evidence.

The court also held that the verdicts were not inconsistent, as each sexual assault count related to a distinct event and had to be evaluated individually based on the evidence of consent at the time.

The court issued a supplementary costs endorsement to clarify a previous costs award of $7,500 to the third parties following the dismissal of the defendant's motion to validate service.

The court clarified that the third parties had only sought costs for the motion before this judge, and not for a prior 2014 motion before a different judge.

The original costs award of $7,500 was maintained as fair and reasonable.

The applicant, charged with child pornography and luring offences, brought an application for a stay of proceedings alleging his right to a trial within a reasonable time under s. 11(b) of the Charter was infringed.

The total delay was approximately 43 months.

After deducting defence delay and discrete events, the net delay exceeded the 30-month presumptive ceiling established in Jordan.

However, applying the transitional exceptional circumstances framework, the court found the delay was justified under the previous Morin guidelines.

The application was dismissed.

The moving party, a former employee, brought a motion for summary judgment on his counterclaim for defamation against his former employer.

The former employer had sued him for breach of fiduciary duty and misappropriation of proprietary information, and the employee counterclaimed based on emails sent by the employer to his new workplace.

The court dismissed the motion, finding that the truth or falsity of the allegedly defamatory statements was intimately bound up with the main claim, requiring a full trial to resolve credibility issues.

The appellant appealed his conviction for assault causing bodily harm and his sentence of nine months' imprisonment.

He argued the trial judge erred in assessing credibility, applying uneven scrutiny, failing to apply the W.D. framework correctly, and providing insufficient reasons.

The summary conviction appeal judge dismissed the conviction appeal, finding no errors in the trial judge's credibility assessments or application of legal principles.

The sentence appeal was also dismissed as the sentence was not demonstrably unfit given the unprovoked nature of the attack and the appellant's prior record, though the sentence was varied to credit 74 days of pre-sentence custody.

The applicant, facing extradition to Romania for a murder conviction, brought a disclosure application to obtain records from the Canadian and Romanian governments to support an abuse of process motion based on allegations of torture.

The court dismissed the application, applying the Larosa test and finding no 'air of reality' to the torture allegations due to significant inconsistencies in the applicant's evidence and his failure to disclose his conviction to Canadian immigration authorities.

The court also found the requested documents were largely irrelevant or amounted to a fishing expedition.

The accused brought an application to stay charges of possession of cocaine for the purpose of trafficking and possession of proceeds of crime, alleging a breach of his s. 11(b) Charter right to be tried within a reasonable time.

The total delay was 39 months, breaching the 30-month ceiling established in Jordan.

The court calculated the net delay at 34 months after deducting 5 months of defence delay.

Because this was a transitional case, the court applied the transitional exceptional circumstances doctrine, finding that the parties reasonably relied on the previous Morin framework and that the delay would not have warranted a stay under Morin.

The application was dismissed.

The plaintiff franchisor brought a motion for summary judgment against the defendant franchisee for unpaid royalties, advertising fees, and rent.

The defendants did not dispute the amounts owed but argued they were entitled to equitable set-off due to the franchisor's alleged breaches of the franchise agreement and the duty of fair dealing under the Arthur Wishart Act.

The court granted summary judgment, finding the case suitable for summary determination and concluding that the defendants' complaints did not meet the test for equitable set-off.

The court also declined to stay the execution of the judgment pending the defendants' counterclaim.

The appellant appealed his summary conviction for breaching a bail condition that required him to stay 150 meters away from the complainant.

At trial, the judge accepted the complainant's evidence and rejected the evidence of the appellant and his wife.

On appeal, the appellant argued the trial judge erred in his findings of fact and failed to consider a conspiracy against him.

The Superior Court dismissed the appeal, holding that the trial judge's credibility findings are entitled to great deference and the evidence supported the conviction.

The appellant was found asleep in the driver's seat of her vehicle and subsequently blew over the legal limit.

At trial, she was convicted of having care and control of a motor vehicle while impaired, failing to rebut the presumption under s. 258(1)(a) of the Criminal Code.

On appeal, she argued the trial judge misapprehended the evidence and improperly assessed her credibility against a reasonable person standard.

The Superior Court dismissed the appeal, finding the trial judge's credibility assessments were entitled to deference and no material error was made.

The Crown appealed a conditional discharge and refusal to make a DNA order imposed on the respondent for breaching a no-contact bail condition.

The respondent had met his wife for coffee while on bail for domestic assault charges.

The summary conviction appeal judge found no error in principle in the trial judge's reasoning and held that the sentence was not demonstrably unfit.

The refusal to order a DNA sample was also upheld, as a sample had already been ordered for the underlying assault conviction.

The appeal was dismissed.

The appellant was convicted of driving with a blood alcohol level over 80 after failing a roadside screening test and providing breath samples of 125mg and 100mg.

On appeal, he argued the trial judge erred in assessing whether the police officer had an objective basis for the demand given the potential presence of mouth alcohol, and that the trial judge provided inadequate reasons regarding care and control.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the appeal, finding the trial judge properly applied the objective standard, made credibility findings entitled to deference, and that the path to conviction was clear because the Crown relied on the appellant's admission of driving prior to being found in the driveway.

Jacobus Hanemaayer was found in contempt of court for wilfully refusing to comply with orders.

Despite claims of poor health and age, he repeatedly failed to appear in court and provided insufficient medical evidence.

The court found his health claims to be a "sham" based on evidence from a process server who observed him operating an electric scooter alone.

Consequently, the court decided against immediate sentencing and instead issued a discretionary bench warrant, requiring Hanemaayer to appear in person to show cause why he should not be sentenced to incarceration for his deliberate and wilful non-compliance with court orders.

In a criminal trial for break and enter, the Crown sought to introduce a video statement, an alibi note, and judicial pre-trial transcripts as evidence of the accused's consciousness of guilt.

The accused, who was self-represented, conceded the voluntariness of the video statement.

The court granted the admission of the video statement, with the exception of portions where the accused suggested checking his work whereabouts, allowing its use for cross-examination if the accused testified.

However, the court dismissed the Crown's applications to admit the alibi note and the pre-trial transcripts.

It found that the alibi note, though false, lacked independent evidence of deliberate fabrication to meet the "demonstrably false" threshold for consciousness of guilt.

Furthermore, the court ruled that admitting transcripts of a self-represented accused's utterances from mandatory judicial pre-trials would be highly unfair, undermine the pre-trial process, and violate principles against compelled admissions.