Ronald Charlebois

The accused applied for a declaration that his arrest and the subsequent search of his vehicle violated ss. 8 and 9 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Police arrested the accused after surveillance based largely on untested confidential informant information and ambiguous observations of a brief meeting between vehicles.

The court held that the police lacked objectively reasonable and probable grounds for arrest, as the informant information was insufficiently verified and the observed conduct was not inherently incriminating.

The arrest therefore constituted arbitrary detention and the search incidental to arrest was unlawful.

Applying the framework in Grant, the court found the Charter breaches sufficiently serious that admitting the discovered drugs would bring the administration of justice into disrepute.

During a sexual assault trial, the Crown sought to introduce evidence that the complainant applied under the Mandatory Blood Testing Act, 2006 for an order requiring the accused to provide a blood sample for communicable disease testing.

The court held that the application constituted a prior consistent statement intended to bolster the complainant’s credibility regarding the occurrence of sexual contact.

The court rejected the Crown’s argument that the evidence formed part of the narrative of events.

Because the accused had not raised allegations of recent fabrication or lack of recent complaint, the evidence was inadmissible at that stage of the trial.

The court noted the issue could be revisited if the defence later opened the door through cross-examination.