Robert Wadden

The defendant pleaded guilty to break and enter of a residential property, taking a motor vehicle without consent, and breach of recognizance.

The defendant, a 20-year-old with no criminal record, unlawfully entered a family home while the owners were on vacation, hosted parties over three days resulting in over $130,000 in property damage and theft, and subsequently breached his release conditions by consuming alcohol.

The Crown sought six months jail followed by probation, while the defence sought a 90-day intermittent sentence for the break and enter and a six-month conditional sentence for the other offences.

The court imposed six months jail followed by two years probation for the break and enter, with concurrent one-month sentences for the other offences, along with restitution, counselling conditions, and a firearms prohibition.

The accused, charged as a youth with four counts of indecent assault alleged to have occurred in 1980, brought a Charter s. 11(b) application seeking to stay proceedings for unreasonable delay.

The charges were laid on July 30, 2015, with trial scheduled for June 14-17, 2017, approximately 22.5 months later.

The court applied the framework established in R. v. Jordan, determining that while the case exceeded the presumptive 18-month ceiling on its face, the delay attributable to a severance decision constituted an exceptional circumstance.

After deducting the delay caused by the severance and defence unavailability, the court calculated the net delay at approximately 14.75 months, below the threshold.

The application was dismissed and the case proceeded to trial.

The accused was convicted after trial of multiple firearms offences, including discharging a firearm contrary to section 244.2(3) of the Criminal Code.

He brought a Charter application under section 12 to challenge the mandatory minimum sentence of seven years as grossly disproportionate.

The court applied the framework from R. v. Lloyd and determined that the mandatory minimum was not grossly disproportionate given the accused's prior conviction for armed robbery, the circumstances of the current offence involving multiple discharges in a residential area, and the appropriate sentencing range for such offences.

The Charter application was dismissed and the accused was sentenced to eight years imprisonment.

A federal Crown corporation sought to quash a production order issued under the Criminal Code requiring disclosure of customer information.

The applicant argued that section 24.3 of the Export Development Act created a legal privilege protecting customer information from disclosure during criminal investigations, though it acknowledged an exception for prosecutions.

The court rejected this argument, finding that the term "privileged" in the statute referred to confidential information rather than a legal privilege, and that the exception for "prosecuting an offence" included prospective prosecutions and investigative stages when authorized by a judicial order.

The court held that the applicant must comply with the production order.

The accused was convicted after trial of attempted murder of his wife, aggravated assault, assault with a weapon, and attempted suffocation.

The Crown sought 15 years imprisonment while the defence sought 7 years.

The court imposed 11 years imprisonment, less presentence custody of 2 years and 8 months, resulting in a remaining sentence of 8 years and 4 months.

The court found the attack was planned, deliberate, and persistent, committed in a domestic context with a weapon, causing severe and ongoing harm to the victim.

Mitigating factors included the offender's lack of criminal record, prior good character, and expressed remorse.

The court applied the Kienapple principle to stay charges of aggravated assault and assault with a weapon, but upheld the attempted suffocation conviction as a separate offence.

Ancillary orders included a lifetime weapons prohibition, DNA databank order, and prohibition on contact with the victim and children.

The accused was charged with operating a motor vehicle while impaired and with a blood-alcohol concentration over 80 milligrams per 100 millilitres of blood, contrary to s. 253(1)(a) and (b) of the Criminal Code.

The vehicle in question was an electric scooter.

The court determined that the electric scooter constituted a motor vehicle within the definition in s. 2 of the Criminal Code, as it was designed to be propelled by means other than muscular power.

The court rejected the defence argument that the vehicle was not a motor vehicle when operating without battery power, finding that the nature of the vehicle, not its operability at a particular moment, determines its classification.

The court also found that the Crown proved beyond a reasonable doubt that the accused's blood-alcohol concentration exceeded 80 at the time of operation, rejecting the defence argument regarding bolus drinking based on the presence of a partially consumed bottle of wine.

The accused was found guilty on both counts.

The accused was charged with attempted murder, aggravated assault, assault with a weapon, and suffocation following a brutal attack on his wife with a baseball bat in their garage.

The accused admitted to the assault with a weapon but denied the specific intent to kill required for attempted murder and denied attempting to suffocate the victim.

The court found the accused guilty of all charges, determining that the circumstances of the attack—including the deliberate choice of a deadly weapon, the targeting of the victim's head, the repeated blows, the attempt to suffocate, and the unrelenting nature of the assault—demonstrated a specific intent to kill beyond a reasonable doubt.

The accused were charged with seventeen counts including uttering threats, forcible confinement, extortion, assault, intimidation, being unlawfully in a dwelling, and firearms offences.

The charges arose from incidents occurring in late November and early December 2013 in an apartment building in Ottawa.

The Crown alleged the accused took over an apartment and committed various crimes within it.

Following a trial on the merits, the court found the accused guilty on several counts related to possession of a prohibited firearm, threatening with a firearm, and extortion, but acquitted them on other counts including unlawful confinement and various assault-related charges.

The accused was charged with impaired driving, operation over 80 mg/100 ml of blood alcohol, dangerous driving, and failing to remain at the scene of an accident.

The court dismissed the accused's Charter application challenging the validity of the breath demand and the admissibility of evidence.

The court found the accused guilty of impaired driving, operation over 80, and dangerous driving, but acquitted him of failing to remain at the scene.

The court found that while the initial breath demand by the arresting officer was not read as soon as practicable, the subsequent demand by the qualified technician was valid and properly obtained.

The accused was charged with impaired care or control and operating a motor vehicle with a blood alcohol concentration exceeding 80 mg/100ml.

The accused brought a Charter application alleging violations of sections 8 and 9 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, challenging the validity of the Approved Screening Device demand and seeking exclusion of breath readings.

The court found that the officer had articulable cause to investigate the accused based on common law powers, that the officer had reasonable grounds to suspect alcohol consumption based on the totality of circumstances, and that the ASD demand was validly made forthwith.

The court dismissed the Charter application, admitted the breath evidence, and found the accused guilty of the "over 80" offence while acquitting on the impaired care or control charge due to insufficient evidence.

The accused was charged with driving with a blood alcohol level over 80 mg/100 ml contrary to section 253(1)(b) of the Criminal Code.

At trial, the accused brought a Charter application alleging breaches of sections 8, 9, and 10 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The accused challenged the validity of the traffic stop, the grounds for the roadside screening demand, and the timing of rights to counsel.

The court found that the traffic stop was lawful under the Highway Traffic Act, that the officer had reasonable grounds to make the roadside demand, and that any delay in providing rights to counsel was minimal and did not constitute a Charter violation.

The court dismissed the Charter application and found the accused guilty.

The accused was charged with two counts of discharging a firearm and seven other firearms offences in relation to the shooting of a victim in July 2012.

The Crown's case rested entirely on the testimony of an unsavoury witness, a career criminal with a lengthy record who claimed to have been present at the shooting.

The victim testified that he did not see his shooter and could not identify the accused.

The court found the unsavoury witness's testimony unreliable due to his criminal history, his admission of perjury, contradictions with physical evidence, and direct contradiction with the victim's testimony.

The court acquitted the accused of all charges, finding insufficient evidence to meet the Crown's burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt.

The Crown brought an ex parte, in camera application mid-trial seeking an order to exclude the public from the courtroom pursuant to section 486 of the Criminal Code due to an alleged security breach.

The court considered whether it had jurisdiction to hear an ex parte application during trial and concluded that such hearings are permissible in certain circumstances where they do not prejudice the accused's ability to defend himself or have knowledge of matters affecting his vital interests.

The court found that the application concerned court security rather than the substantive trial and therefore proceeded ex parte.

Evidence of a security breach was accepted, and an order excluding members of the public from the courtroom was granted, with specified exceptions for accredited press, court staff, Law Society members, and other designated persons.

The accused pleaded guilty to possession of crack cocaine contrary to s. 4(3) of the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act.

After sentencing to seven days jail with enhanced credit for presentence custody resulting in one additional day, the court addressed the mandatory victim surcharge under s. 737 of the Criminal Code.

Duty counsel sought to waive the surcharge based on the recent decision in R. v. Michael, which declared s. 737 unconstitutional as cruel and unusual punishment.

The court rejected this argument, finding that sufficient judicial flexibility exists to avoid undue harshness in applying the victim surcharge provisions, particularly through the principle of totality in sentencing on multiple offences and the ability to impose modest fines to offset cumulative surcharges.

The applicant was charged with thirteen firearms-related offences, including possession of a loaded prohibited firearm.

He brought a Charter application alleging breaches of sections 8 and 9 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, seeking exclusion of evidence of the firearm.

Police responded to a noise complaint and encountered the applicant in a stairwell with another individual.

Officers detected a strong smell of marijuana, observed suspicious hand movements by the applicant, and conducted a pat-down search for officer safety, discovering a loaded 9mm handgun.

The court found the detention was lawful for investigative purposes and the pat-down search was justified on safety grounds.

The application was dismissed.