S. DiGiuseppe

The Crown brought a pre-trial motion seeking to admit circumstantial evidence to challenge the accused's narrative of how he came into possession of the handgun used in the Eaton Centre shooting.

The Crown sought to introduce evidence linking a third party to a prior shooting where the same gun was used, and letters suggesting the accused knew the third party.

The court dismissed the application, finding that the suggested links were too speculative and that admitting the evidence to challenge the accused's credibility on a critical issue would be unfair and unreasonable.

The accused, charged with murder and other offences arising from a shooting at the Toronto Eaton Centre, brought a Corbett application to exclude reference to a prior sexual assault conviction and the fact he was on bail at the time of the shooting.

The Crown argued the full record was relevant to the accused's diagnosis of Antisocial Personality Disorder and his credibility.

The court granted the application, finding that the accused's extensive admitted criminal history provided sufficient information for the jury to assess credibility and malingering, and that the sexual assault conviction and bail status would be unnecessarily prejudicial.

The offender was convicted of second-degree murder by a jury after shooting his friend and drug trafficking partner multiple times with an illegal handgun.

The Crown sought 16 years of parole ineligibility, while the defence sought 10 to 12 years.

The jury recommendations ranged from 20 to 25 years.

The court considered aggravating factors, including the extreme violence, use of an illegal handgun, and post-offence conduct, alongside mitigating factors such as the offender's youth, Aboriginal heritage, expressions of remorse, and pre-trial custody conditions.

The court sentenced the offender to life imprisonment with no parole eligibility for 14 years, along with ancillary weapons, DNA, and non-communication orders.

The accused, charged in a shooting death, sought to introduce expert psychiatric evidence regarding the 'fight or flight' reaction to explain his perception and memory of the events.

The court dismissed the application, finding that the proposed evidence did not meet the necessity test for expert evidence.

The court held that the biological mechanics of a fight or flight response and its effects on perception are within the ordinary experience and common sense of a jury.

Furthermore, the probative value of the evidence was outweighed by the risk of usurping the jury's role and oath-helping.

The accused, charged with second degree murder, brought an application for a stay of proceedings under s. 11(b) of the Charter, arguing unreasonable delay.

The total delay was 44.5 months.

After deducting defence delay and delay caused by exceptional circumstances—including unexpectedly lengthy pre-trial motions and an interlocutory appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada by Crime Stoppers regarding informer privilege—the net delay fell below the 30-month presumptive ceiling established in Jordan.

The application for a stay was dismissed.

The accused, charged with second-degree murder, brought an application to exclude several statements made to police under sections 7, 8, 9, and 10 of the Charter.

The Crown brought a corresponding application to admit the statements as voluntary.

The court found that the accused's initial statements at the scene and during the first part of his police station interview were voluntary and not obtained in breach of the Charter.

However, the court found that the accused was detained during the second part of the interview, his Charter rights were violated, and the statements were involuntary due to oppressive police conduct and improper inducements.

Consequently, the second part of the interview was excluded under section 24(2) of the Charter.

Statements made following his subsequent arrest were partially admitted and partially excluded based on voluntariness.

The accused brought an application seeking a stay of proceedings for unreasonable delay under s. 11(b) of the Charter after approximately 34.5 months in custody awaiting trial on multiple drug and firearm trafficking charges arising from a large multi‑accused investigation.

Applying the framework from R. v. Morin and R. v. Askov, the court examined the allocation of delay between inherent time, defence actions, Crown conduct, and institutional delay.

The court found the prosecution involved complex multi‑accused proceedings, extensive disclosure, a preliminary inquiry including a Dawson application challenging wiretap authorizations, and multiple defence‑initiated adjournments and counsel changes.

Institutional delay was determined to be within acceptable limits and much of the elapsed time was attributable to inherent or defence‑related factors.

The applicant failed to establish significant prejudice beyond the normal hardships of pre‑trial custody.

The application for a stay of proceedings was therefore dismissed.

The accused brought a constitutional application challenging the exclusion of common-law spouses from the spousal incompetency rule in s. 4 of the Canada Evidence Act and the related common law.

The court considered whether the distinction between married spouses and common-law partners violated s. 15(1) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Applying evolving equality jurisprudence following Quebec (Attorney General) v. A., the court held that denying common-law partners the protections afforded to married spouses constituted discrimination based on marital status.

The court further concluded that the infringement was not justified under s. 1 of the Charter because excluding common-law spouses was not rationally connected to the objective of protecting conjugal confidences and marital harmony.

The appropriate remedy was to read common-law spouses into s. 4 of the Canada Evidence Act and the common law spousal incompetence rule.

The Crown brought a motion seeking to introduce evidence from several witnesses that would disclose prior criminal conduct and other discreditable acts by the accused in a murder prosecution.

The Crown argued the evidence was relevant to motive, the relationship between the accused and witnesses, and consciousness of guilt, including allegations that the accused plotted to eliminate a key witness.

The court applied the established rule that evidence of disreputable conduct is presumptively inadmissible unless its probative value outweighs its prejudicial effect.

The court held that most of the proposed evidence formed part of the narrative explaining the motive and relationships surrounding the alleged homicide and was therefore admissible with limiting instructions.

Certain evidence, including alleged assaults on a spouse, buried firearms, and an ante‑mortem statement attributed to the deceased, was excluded as marginally relevant and of questionable probative value.