Scott C. Hutchison

The Crown appealed an order quashing a sealing order on search warrants and informations related to an investigation into a meat packing plant.

The Court of Appeal found that the original judge committed a jurisdictional error by denying a media representative an adjournment to seek counsel.

Applying the Dagenais/Mentuck framework, the Court held that a sealing order was not justified merely to prevent the potential tainting of witness statements, but was necessary to protect the identity of a confidential informant.

The appeal was allowed to a very limited extent to permit further redactions to the informations before their public release.

The appellant installed a video surveillance camera facing his neighbour's backyard, recording 24 hours a day for over a month due to barking dogs.

He was charged with mischief for interfering with the lawful use and enjoyment of property.

He was acquitted at trial but convicted on summary conviction appeal.

The Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal, finding that the continuous surveillance objectively and subjectively interfered with the neighbour's enjoyment of her property, and the appellant acted knowingly or recklessly.

The appellant was convicted of second-degree murder of his girlfriend and sentenced to life imprisonment with 10 years of parole ineligibility.

He appealed his conviction, arguing the jury charge on motive and reasonable doubt was flawed.

The Crown appealed the sentence, seeking an increased period of parole ineligibility.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal, finding no errors in the jury instructions.

The Court allowed the Crown's sentence appeal, holding the trial judge erred in minimizing the aggravating features of intimate partner violence and indignities to the victim's body.

The period of parole ineligibility was increased to 12 years.

The appellant appealed his conviction and sentence.

The conviction appeal was abandoned and dismissed.

On the sentence appeal, the Court of Appeal found the sentencing judge erred by failing to credit the appellant for one year of pre-trial custody spent at the Toronto East Detention Centre, having mistakenly believed the time was solely due to parole revocation.

Leave to appeal sentence was granted and the sentence was reduced by one year to 12 years consecutive.

The respondent mother abducted her three children and fled to Mexico, fearing she would lose all access to them at an upcoming custody hearing.

She was acquitted at trial of abduction in contravention of a custody order after the trial judge left the statutory defence of necessity to the jury.

The Crown appealed.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal and ordered a new trial, finding there was no air of reality to the necessity defence because the anticipated loss of access through a lawful court order did not constitute 'imminent harm' and the respondent had reasonable legal alternatives available.

The appellant, a taxi driver, repeatedly solicited fares at Pearson International Airport without a permit, contrary to regulations and notices under the Trespass to Property Act.

An airport inspector attempted to arrest the appellant for trespassing under s. 9 of the Act.

The appellant resisted, shoving his car door into the inspector and fleeing.

The trial judge acquitted the appellant of assault with intent to resist arrest, finding the inspector had no authority to use reasonable force.

The Court of Appeal substituted a conviction.

The Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the appeal, holding that the power of arrest under the Trespass to Property Act implicitly includes the authority to use reasonable force to effect and maintain the arrest.

The appellant motorcyclist was stopped at a police roadcheck and refused an officer's request to remove his helmet for inspection.

He was arrested and charged with obstructing a peace officer under the Criminal Code.

The Court of Appeal held that while the Highway Traffic Act imposes a duty on motorcyclists to submit their helmets for inspection, the legislature provided a specific enforcement mechanism (a fine) for failing to do so.

Because the officer did not attempt to use this statutory enforcement mechanism, he was not entitled to invoke the more serious Criminal Code offence of obstructing a peace officer.

The appeal was allowed and an acquittal entered.

The corporate appellants appealed their convictions and sentence for offences related to a scheme selling shares of tickets in a Spanish lottery to American consumers.

The trial judge convicted them under sections 206(1) and 202(1) of the Criminal Code, entering conditional stays on all but one count based on the Kienapple principle, and imposed a $100,000 fine.

On appeal, the appellants raised issues regarding the requirement of an additional element of chance, acting as agents for buyers, the definition of betting or wagering, and the exemption under section 207(1)(h).

The Court of Appeal found no error in the trial judge's rejection of these arguments and upheld both the convictions and the sentence.

The appellants appealed a decision of the Prince Edward Island Court of Appeal finding an Internet lottery scheme unlawful under the Criminal Code.

The Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the appeal from the bench, adopting the reasons of the Chief Justice of Prince Edward Island.

The appellant sought leave to appeal the dismissal of his summary conviction appeal, arguing ineffective assistance of counsel at trial regarding the use of videotape evidence.

The Court of Appeal refused leave to appeal due to a largely unexplained three-year delay in moving the appeal forward.

The Court also noted that the ineffective assistance of counsel argument lacked merit, as the decision not to use the videotape did not approach the level of ineffective assistance.

The appellant appealed his convictions for counterfeiting and possession of counterfeit money.

He admitted to producing copies of $20 bills using a computer and scanner, but argued he did not intend them to resemble current Canadian currency and altered their size.

On appeal, he argued the trial judge erred in instructing the jury on the elements of the offence and by making improper comments about his credibility and dishonesty.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no air of reality to the claim that the jury could have doubted his knowledge that the bills were counterfeit.

The court also held that, reading the charge as a whole, the trial judge did not improperly remove the issue of credibility from the jury.

The Crown appealed as of right to the Supreme Court of Canada from a judgment of the Court of Appeal for Ontario, which had allowed the accused's appeal from his robbery conviction and ordered a new trial based on issues related to hearsay evidence.

The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal, adopting the reasons of the Court of Appeal.

The appellant appealed its conviction relating to the operation of two crane games, arguing they were games of skill rather than mixed chance and skill under s. 206(1)(f) of the Criminal Code.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, upholding the trial judge's finding that the games involved an overwhelming degree of chance and only a minimal element of skill for the ordinary player.

The court noted that virtually all elements of the game were beyond the player's control, making it a game of mixed chance and skill.

The accused taxi driver challenged convictions arising from repeated breaches of an airport trespass notice issued to enforce a regulatory prohibition on unlicensed passenger pickups.

The court held that, even assuming liberty interests were engaged, the notice did not offend s. 7 of the Charter because it was proportionate and tailored to the accused’s persistent unlawful conduct, and that arrest under s. 9 of the Trespass to Property Act was not arbitrary.

On the Crown’s appeal, the court held that the statutory power of arrest carried with it the ancillary common law authority to use reasonable force to make the arrest effective.

The accused’s appeal was dismissed, the Crown’s appeal was allowed, a conviction was entered on the assault with intent to resist arrest count, and the matter was remitted for sentencing.

The accused taxi driver challenged convictions arising from repeated breaches of an airport trespass notice issued to enforce a regulatory prohibition on unlicensed passenger pickups.

The court held that, even assuming liberty interests were engaged, the notice did not offend s. 7 of the Charter because it was proportionate and tailored to the accused’s persistent unlawful conduct, and that arrest under s. 9 of the Trespass to Property Act was not arbitrary.

On the Crown’s appeal, the court held that the statutory power of arrest carried with it the ancillary common law authority to use reasonable force to make the arrest effective.

The accused’s appeal was dismissed, the Crown’s appeal was allowed, a conviction was entered on the assault with intent to resist arrest count, and the matter was remitted for sentencing.

The appellant was convicted of impaired driving causing death and sentenced to four years in prison.

He appealed his conviction, arguing that the search warrant used to seize his blood sample from the hospital was invalid due to the police officer's failure to disclose a prior warrant refusal.

He also argued the trial judge erred by refusing to compel the prosecuting attorney to testify on the voir dire.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding that the non-disclosure did not invalidate the warrant because the second information was substantially different and the omission was not intended to mislead.

The court also upheld the trial judge's refusal to compel the prosecutor to testify and agreed that the blood sample was non-conscriptive evidence that should not be excluded under section 24(2) of the Charter.

The appellant appealed convictions for uttering a forged document, breach of recognizance, and fraud under $5,000, as well as a nine-month custodial sentence.

The court rejected the challenge to the identification evidence, holding that the trial judge was entitled to accept the courier manager's identification despite an initial mistaken photo lineup selection.

The Crown conceded that the full offence of uttering had not been made out because the document was not dealt with by the intended recipient as genuine.

The appeal was therefore allowed in part by substituting a conviction for attempting to utter a forged document and reducing the sentence on that count to three months concurrent.

The appellant appealed his conviction for leaving the scene of an accident.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding that the suggestion the appellant did not leave the scene with the intent to flee civil or criminal liability was totally destroyed by the evidence.

The Court held that regardless of whether the trial judge was correct in her treatment of the presumption, the result would necessarily have been the same.

The young person appellant and an adult co-accused were charged separately with murder.

The appellant was compelled to testify at the adult's preliminary inquiry, during which the Crown extensively questioned him about his own involvement, leading to self-incriminating statements.

This compelled testimony was then used to elicit incriminating evidence from another witness, who later testified at the appellant's trial.

The Court of Appeal held that the Crown's predominant purpose at the preliminary inquiry was to build a case against the appellant, violating his section 7 Charter rights against self-incrimination.

The derivative evidence should have been excluded.

The appeal was allowed and a new trial ordered.

The appellant appealed a conviction for keeping a common bawdy house arising from the operation of a commercial house of domination offering sadomasochistic services.

The court held that the trial judge reasonably found the erotica sessions were primarily sexual in nature and constituted prostitution because they involved lewd acts for payment for the sexual gratification of clients on a frequent and habitual basis.

The court upheld the admission of a videotape corroborating the commercial services, agreed that most of the proposed expert evidence was irrelevant or insufficiently reliable under the governing expert evidence framework, and found that the search-related Charter breaches did not justify a stay.

The appeal was dismissed.