Rochelle Liberman

The court sentenced Spiro Tsakopoulos for manslaughter after a guilty plea, following the shooting death of Bryson Murle.

The sentencing reasons review the circumstances of the offence, the impact on the victim’s family, the offender’s background, and the aggravating and mitigating factors.

The court found the case fell within the mid-range for manslaughter with a firearm and imposed a 10-year sentence before credit for pre-sentence custody, with appropriate statutory orders.

The decision concerns the admissibility of ante-mortem statements made by the deceased, Elvie Sig-od and Angelica Sig-od, in the prosecution of Godfrey Sig-od for their murders.

The Crown sought to admit out-of-court utterances and statements under the principled exception to the hearsay rule, arguing necessity and reliability.

The court reviewed the circumstances of the statements, the relationship history, and the legal standards for necessity and threshold reliability, ultimately admitting the statements with some exclusions for prejudicial content.

This decision sets the period of parole ineligibility for Godfrey Sig-od, convicted of first-degree murder of his ex-wife and second-degree murder of his daughter.

The court reviews the facts, the character of the offender, the circumstances of the offence, the recommendations of the jury, and relevant case law.

The court imposes life imprisonment without parole for 25 years for the first-degree murder and life imprisonment with parole ineligibility for 18 years for the second-degree murder, emphasizing the gravity of the offence, breach of trust, and the need for denunciation and deterrence.

The accused, Beum Kim, was convicted after a judge-alone trial of aggravated assault, sexual assault with a weapon, assault with a weapon, forcible confinement, threatening death, extortion, and fraud under $5,000.

The offences involved the torture and sexual assault of the complainant over 33 hours.

The Crown sought a 9-year sentence, while the Defence proposed a 4-year global sentence.

The court considered aggravating factors, including the brutality of the acts and reoffending while on bail, and mitigating factors, such as pre-sentence custody and strict bail conditions.

The court imposed a global sentence of 9 years imprisonment, less 6 months for pre-sentence custody and Downes credit, resulting in 8.5 years further custody.

Ancillary orders included a communication prohibition, SOIRA registration for 20 years, a DNA order, and a lifetime weapons prohibition.

The accused, Efren Chimbo, pleaded guilty to multiple sexual offences, including sexual assault, possession of child pornography, making surreptitious visual recordings, and making child pornography, involving young female models.

The Crown sought a global sentence of four years imprisonment, while the defence requested a conditional sentence of two years less a day.

The court considered aggravating factors such as the abuse of persons under 18, grooming, and violation of privacy, alongside mitigating factors including the guilty plea, lack of relevant criminal record, community support, and compliance with bail conditions.

Applying the principles of denunciation and deterrence, particularly for offences involving children, the court determined that a conditional sentence was inappropriate and imposed a global sentence of 2.5 years imprisonment, along with various ancillary orders.

S.H., a 19-year-old with a lengthy youth record, was detained on secondary and tertiary grounds for firearm possession offences after a loaded handgun was found on him while being treated for gunshot wounds.

He applied for a bail review, arguing that the COVID-19 pandemic constituted a material change in circumstances, increasing his risk in custody and providing a strong incentive to comply with bail conditions, especially with electronic monitoring.

The court considered the strong Crown case, gravity of the offence, and circumstances of the offence, which favored detention.

However, it also weighed the public health imperative of reducing inmate populations during the pandemic, supported by expert epidemiological evidence, and the anticipated trial delays.

The court found that with strict conditions, including electronic monitoring via Recovery Science Corporation (RSC) for GPS tracking, the applicant could be safely released, thereby enhancing public confidence in the administration of justice by contributing to public health efforts.

The accused pleaded guilty to two counts of attempted murder for attacking his 8-year-old son and 6-year-old daughter with a hammer.

The attacks occurred during a scheduled access visit following a marital separation.

The court emphasized denunciation and deterrence given the domestic context and the extreme breach of parental trust.

The accused was sentenced to 15 years' imprisonment, reduced to 11 years after applying enhanced credit for pre-sentence custody and harsh lockdown conditions.

The accused was charged with sexual assault, assault, forcible confinement, theft, mischief, and uttering a death threat arising from events between February and October 2016 in a domestic relationship.

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

While the court found the complainant generally credible despite some concerns about her truthfulness regarding peripheral matters, it determined that the Crown had not proven most charges beyond a reasonable doubt due to lack of corroboration.

However, the court found the accused guilty of assault (scratching the complainant's neck on October 29-30, 2016) and mischief (breaking the complainant's cell phone at Pacific Mall), as these incidents were corroborated by physical evidence and circumstantial facts.

The accused, Jesse French, was charged with aggravated assault and robbery following a brutal attack on Bryan Lavoie, which resulted in the loss of Mr. Lavoie's left eye.

The Crown's case relied on Mr. Lavoie's identification and surveillance video.

The defence challenged the identification, citing inconsistencies in Mr. Lavoie's testimony and contradictions with prior statements and video evidence.

The court found Mr. Lavoie's evidence unreliable due to intoxication, trauma, and discrepancies with prior statements and video footage.

While the accused's post-offence conduct of attempting to clean blood from the scene was noted, it was deemed insufficient to establish guilt beyond a reasonable doubt without corroborating evidence of direct involvement in the assault.

The accused was found not guilty on both counts.

The 83-year-old offender was convicted of historical sexual offences against his stepdaughter and niece, committed between 1969 and 1997.

The abuse of the stepdaughter involved frequent, escalating sexual acts including full intercourse over five years while she was between the ages of four and nine.

The court found the offender's position of trust, the young age of the victims, the prolonged duration, and the devastating impact on the victims to be significant aggravating factors.

The offender was sentenced to a total of 5 years and 45 days in a penitentiary.

Sentencing following conviction for aggravated assault arising from a knife attack outside a bar after a heated altercation involving racial insults.

The accused, a first-time substantive offender, slashed the victim with a large knife approximately twenty minutes after a verbal confrontation in which the victim directed racist epithets at him.

The court held that denunciation and deterrence were primary sentencing objectives for a serious violent assault with a weapon.

However, mitigating factors included the offender’s youth, lack of criminal record, significant rehabilitation prospects, and the racially provocative circumstances preceding the offence.

A custodial sentence below the penitentiary range was imposed, followed by probation with anger management counselling.

The offender was convicted by a jury of manslaughter after being charged with second degree murder in the fatal stabbing of an intimate partner during a domestic argument.

The sentencing judge rejected the offender’s claim that the victim accidentally stabbed himself during a struggle and found that the offender intentionally stabbed the victim in anger during an argument.

Aggravating factors included the domestic relationship, the use of a knife, and the offender’s failure to seek medical assistance for the victim after the stabbing.

Mitigating factors included the offender’s youth, lack of criminal record, remorse, positive rehabilitative efforts while in custody, and difficult personal background.

The court concluded that the moral blameworthiness placed the offence in the upper range of manslaughter cases and imposed a penitentiary sentence of eight years, with credit for pre‑trial custody.

In a trial for second degree murder, the Crown and defence brought pre-trial applications regarding the admissibility of evidence.

The defence sought to introduce evidence of prior violent acts by the deceased to support a claim of self-defence.

The Crown sought to introduce evidence of the deceased's good character, the accused's bad character, and ante-mortem statements made by the deceased.

The court ruled that evidence of the deceased's prior violent acts was admissible.

The Crown's application to introduce the deceased's good character was largely dismissed, except for evidence of his non-violent disposition at work.

The Crown's application to introduce the accused's bad character was dismissed due to its prejudicial effect outweighing its probative value.

Most of the ante-mortem statements were ruled inadmissible hearsay, save for a statement of intention and lay opinion regarding the accused's tone of voice.

At the commencement of his sexual assault trial, the accused applied under s. 278.1 of the Criminal Code for disclosure of Toronto Police Service occurrence reports relating to the complainant.

The accused argued the records, which included a 2009 finding that the complainant was not criminally responsible in an unrelated matter, were relevant to her credibility and reliability.

The court dismissed the application, finding the records were sought solely for impermissible impeachment purposes, lacked a temporal nexus to the alleged assault, and did not meet the threshold of likely relevance required for production.

The accused brought a Corbett application seeking to exclude his criminal record from being used for cross‑examination should he testify at trial on a sexual assault charge.

The record consisted of three minor convictions arising after the alleged offence and did not involve crimes of dishonesty.

The court held that the probative value of the record for credibility assessment was minimal and that its admission risked unfair prejudice and improper propensity reasoning before the jury.

Given the central credibility contest between the complainant and the accused and the absence of any character attack on the complainant, the balance favoured exclusion.

The accused was convicted of assault causing bodily harm against his sister following a confrontation at a parking lot.

The accused punched his sister in the face after she struck him multiple times during an altercation over her purse, causing her to lose consciousness and suffer facial fractures.

The Crown sought a custodial sentence of six to nine months, later adjusted to ninety days intermittent.

The defence sought a conditional discharge.

The court imposed a monetary fine of $500 plus victim surcharge and eighteen months probation with conditions, finding that incarceration was unnecessary given the accused's background, remorse, and unlikelihood to reoffend, but that a discharge would be contrary to public interest given the severity of the assault.