Robert F. Goldstein

The accused, a former teacher, was found guilty of sexual assault and sexual interference against a former student, M.L., who was 15 at the time of the offence.

The sexual assault count was stayed under the Kienapple principle, and the court proceeded to sentence the accused on the sexual interference count.

The Crown sought a three-year custodial sentence, while the defence sought a conditional sentence.

The court considered aggravating factors, including the breach of trust, the victim's age, the significant impact on the victim, and the grooming behaviour by the accused.

Mitigating factors included the accused's first-offender status and strong community support.

Applying the principles of denunciation and deterrence, and noting that conditional sentences are rarely appropriate for sexual offences against children, the court imposed an 18-month custodial sentence followed by three years of probation, along with various ancillary orders including a DNA order, weapons prohibition, communication prohibition, and sex offender registry placement.

Kalu Solomon pleaded guilty to multiple serious offences, including a gunpoint kidnapping, aggravated assault with a shank on a fellow inmate, and assaults/threats against correctional officers.

The court considered aggravating factors such as his extensive criminal record and institutional misconducts, and mitigating factors including his guilty plea, rehabilitative efforts, strong family support, harsh conditions of custody, and experience of racial slurs.

The Crown sought a global sentence of 8.5 years, while the defence sought a time-served sentence of approximately 6.4 years.

The court imposed a global sentence of 8 years, crediting Solomon with 7 years for pre-sentence custody (including a year of Duncan credit for harsh conditions), resulting in an additional year to serve.

Ancillary orders included a lifetime s. 109 order and a DNA order, plus three years of probation.

Omar Mansour pleaded guilty to possession of a loaded prohibited firearm and breach of a bail condition.

The court considered aggravating factors, including carrying the weapon in public while on bail for drug trafficking and under house arrest, and mitigating factors such as his youth, guilty plea, remorse, family support, and productive use of time in custody.

The Crown sought a 39-month global sentence, while the defence sought 18-24 months (time served).

The judge imposed a global sentence of 36 months, with 32 months credit for time served (including harsh conditions), leaving 4 months to serve, plus three years probation.

A conditional sentence was rejected due to the seriousness of the conduct.

The accused, Rico Harvey, was charged with second-degree murder.

The Crown sought to admit two statements made by the accused to the police.

Defence counsel argued that the statements were not voluntary and that the accused's s. 10(b) Charter rights were violated.

The court found that the police violated the accused's s. 10(b) Charter rights by continuing the first interview despite his expressed dissatisfaction with legal advice and his vulnerable mental state.

The second statement was found to be tainted by the first due to temporal, contextual, and causal connections, including lack of food and sleep.

Applying the Grant factors, the court excluded both statements under s. 24(2) of the Charter, finding the impact on the accused's rights serious and society's interest in adjudication on the merits favoring exclusion given the reliability of other evidence.

The court also found a reasonable doubt regarding the voluntariness of both statements due to oppressive circumstances.

The accused, Carolyn Burden, brought a Rowbotham application for state-funded counsel after Legal Aid denied her request for a change of solicitor and dismissed her appeal.

The Crown opposed the application.

The court dismissed the application, finding that Burden failed to prove indigence and that her right to a fair trial would not be materially compromised if she proceeded unrepresented, given her education and financial background.

The offender pleaded guilty to possession of a loaded prohibited firearm and possession of cocaine for the purpose of trafficking.

The Crown sought a global sentence of four years in custody.

The court found exceptional circumstances, noting the offender's lower moral blameworthiness as she was likely covering for the principal offender, her history of abuse and drug addiction, and her significant strides toward rehabilitation.

Following the repeal of s. 742.1(e) of the Criminal Code, the court imposed a conditional sentence of two years less a day, finding it would not endanger the community and would satisfy the principles of denunciation and deterrence.

This is an appeal by Amadin Asemota from his conviction for assault causing bodily harm and assault with a weapon.

The appellant alleged ineffective assistance of trial counsel, citing various failures including inadequate disclosure review, failure to pursue Charter violations (stolen chain, strip search), improper advice on immigration consequences, breach of the Browne v. Dunn rule, and failure to locate witnesses.

The court found that the appellant failed to establish the factual basis for most of his claims and that trial counsel's conduct did not amount to incompetence.

The court emphasized the deference owed to counsel's strategic decisions, especially given the appellant's uncooperative behaviour and late disclosure of information.

The appeal was dismissed, and the conviction was upheld as safe.

The offender pleaded guilty to human trafficking, pointing a firearm, assault causing bodily harm, unlawful confinement, and receiving a financial benefit from trafficking.

He exercised significant control over the victim, a 20-year-old sex worker, using violence, threats, and manipulation, and kept all her earnings.

The court weighed the aggravating factors of violence and a prior criminal record against the mitigating factors of a guilty plea and harsh pre-sentence custody conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic.

A global sentence of 7 years was imposed, with 4.5 years of enhanced credit for pre-sentence custody, leaving 2.5 years to serve.

The accused, charged with multiple unprovoked violent and sexual assaults, underwent a mandatory 90-day bail review under s. 525 of the Criminal Code.

The court found that the accused was not in a time-served position, had caused the delays by repeatedly firing his counsel, and lacked an adequate release plan.

Given his extensive criminal record and the nature of the allegations, the court concluded there was a substantial likelihood he would re-offend.

The continued detention of the accused was held to be justified on the secondary ground.

Bronson Lake pleaded guilty to second-degree murder of his girlfriend, Kim Gagne.

The court determined the period of parole ineligibility.

The Crown sought 16 years, while the defence argued for a lower end of the range, emphasizing the guilty plea.

The court considered aggravating factors, including the brutality of the domestic violence and lack of clear mental illness, and mitigating factors, such as the guilty plea and lack of prior criminal record.

The judge imposed a life sentence with 14 years of parole ineligibility, finding the brutality of the murder warranted a strong denunciatory sentence.

Ricardo Charleston pleaded guilty to aggravated assault and failure to comply with probation.

This decision concerns his sentencing.

The court reviewed the circumstances of the offence, the offender's background (including sexual abuse, family dynamics, education, employment, and extensive criminal record related to addiction and mental health), and the severe impact on the victim.

The Crown sought a 10-year sentence, while the defence sought 5 years, arguing for time served due to pre-sentence custody and rehabilitation efforts.

The judge imposed a global sentence of 7 years (84 months), crediting 70 months for pre-sentence custody and mitigating factors, resulting in a further 14 months to serve.

A concurrent 3-month sentence was imposed for the probation breach.

The appellant, Mohsin Mirza, appealed his conviction for sexual assault.

The trial judge had found the sexual encounter non-consensual.

The appeal raised three issues: errors in assessing the complainant's credibility and reliability, improper reliance on stereotypes in treating the appellant's evidence, and applying an uneven standard of scrutiny.

The appellate court dismissed the appeal, finding that the arguments essentially amounted to a disagreement with the trial judge's factual findings and that no material misapprehension of evidence or reversible error in credibility assessment was demonstrated.

The applicant applied for certiorari to quash his committal for trial on a charge of first degree murder and substitute a charge of second degree murder.

He argued there was no evidence of forcible confinement or that he was a party to it.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the application, finding that the preliminary inquiry judge made no jurisdictional error.

There was some evidence upon which a properly instructed jury could find that the victim was forcibly confined by an unidentified man acting in concert with the applicant during the shooting.

Loukia Georgiou, mother of a convicted U.S. fraudster, applied for a declaration of entitlement to CAD$9.3 million, which were subject to a U.S. forfeiture order and frozen in Canada via a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty request.

She claimed the funds were either held in trust for her or due to her from a commercial agreement.

The court dismissed the application, finding that the applicant failed to establish a valid interest in the funds and that her claim, supported by highly suspicious documents and implausible oral agreements, was a transparent attempt to avoid forfeiture.

The court found the applicant and her son's evidence lacked credibility.

The offender was convicted of serious sexual offences in both the Superior Court of Justice and the Ontario Court of Justice.

The Crown sought Dangerous Offender (DO) and Long Term Offender (LTO) designations in both proceedings.

The offender brought a motion for directions, arguing that issue estoppel should prevent the Crown from litigating the same DO/LTO issues twice based on similar factual records.

The Superior Court dismissed the motion, holding that issue estoppel does not apply to individual sentencing decisions and that the Criminal Code explicitly contemplates an offender being subject to multiple LTO designations.

The applicant, sought for extradition to the United States for alleged tax fraud, brought an application for the presiding judge to recuse himself.

The recusal application was based on a reasonable apprehension of bias arising after the Crown provided the court with ex parte information concerning public safety and public interest privilege.

The judge appointed amicus curiae to represent the applicant's interests during a closed hearing to determine disclosure of the information.

The judge dismissed the recusal application, finding that the procedures adopted balanced the competing interests and ensured fundamental fairness, such that an informed person would not conclude there was a reasonable apprehension of bias.

The United States requested the extradition of the respondent for an alleged false tax refund scheme.

The respondent was arrested at the airport on a provisional arrest warrant while attempting to board a flight to Russia.

The respondent applied for a stay of proceedings, arguing that the affidavit supporting the warrant contained material omissions and misrepresentations that falsely portrayed him as a flight risk, amounting to an abuse of process.

The Superior Court of Justice dismissed the application, finding that the omitted facts were not material to the issuing judge's decision and that the authorities did not attempt to mislead the court.

The court concluded that the conduct did not rise to the level of an abuse of process.

During a first-degree murder trial, the self-represented accused sought to introduce a hearsay statement made by the deceased victim to a friend.

The Crown conceded necessity but argued the statement lacked threshold reliability.

The court applied the principled approach to hearsay and found that the statement met substantive reliability based on its inherent trustworthiness, corroborated by other evidence.

The court ruled the statement admissible, noting that admitting it also served the interests of trial fairness.

The appellant appealed his summary conviction for sexual assault.

At trial, the judge rejected the appellant's testimony, stating he was an 'old fox' who had tailored his evidence to the case he knew he had to meet.

The Superior Court of Justice found this to be an error of law, as discounting an accused's credibility on the basis of tailored evidence creates a constitutional trap that subverts the right to be present at trial.

Because the trial judge provided no explanation for this conclusion, the appeal was allowed and a new trial ordered.

The accused applied to exclude evidence of 18 kilograms of cocaine, 7 kilograms of crystal methamphetamine, and over $200,000 in cash seized during a drug trafficking investigation.

They alleged multiple Charter violations, including unreasonable search of a condominium parking garage, arbitrary arrest, warrantless entry into a dwelling, and denial of the right to counsel.

The court found that the police did not violate sections 8 or 9 of the Charter, as the accused had no reasonable expectation of privacy in the garage and the police had reasonable grounds for arrest.

However, the court found breaches of section 10(b) due to a failure to hold off questioning and a delay in facilitating access to counsel.

Applying the Grant framework, the court concluded that admitting the evidence would not bring the administration of justice into disrepute and dismissed the application.