Shakir Rahim

The defendants brought a motion to dismiss a $20 million libel action, alleging the plaintiff was actually a declared vexatious litigant using an alias to circumvent a court order requiring leave to commence proceedings.

The plaintiff repeatedly failed to comply with court orders to produce government-issued identification.

The court drew an adverse inference from this failure, concluding the plaintiff was indeed the vexatious litigant using an alias.

The action was dismissed as an abuse of process and for failing to obtain the required leave.

The accused, Diego Doncel, charged with sexual assault, applied under s. 278.3 of the Criminal Code for production of third-party records relating to the complainant, R.W. The application was opposed by the Crown and complainant.

Following a two-stage Mills regime analysis, the court ordered a specific 2010 psychological assessment report from Surrey Place to be disclosed to the defence, finding it relevant to the complainant's capacity to testify and credibility/reliability.

Disclosure was subject to redactions and a non-disclosure condition.

Other requested records from CAMH and Toronto Western Hospital were deemed not relevant or too dated and were not disclosed.

The accused, Diego Doncel, applied under section 278.3 of the Criminal Code for production of various third-party records relating to the complainant, R.W., in a sexual assault case.

R.W. has a severe mental disability.

The court ordered a narrow subset of records (formal assessments or diagnostic evaluations of R.W.'s cognitive functioning) to be produced for judicial review, finding them likely relevant to R.W.'s testimonial competence and credibility/reliability at trial.

The application for broader medical/therapeutic records and records related to an unrelated prior criminal charge involving R.W. (from police and Crown) was denied, as these did not meet the "likely relevant" threshold or were deemed speculative.

The court also declined to order disclosure of identifying details from the unrelated charge to facilitate public record searches.

Appeal from a conviction for sexual assault.

The complainant, the appellant's former girlfriend, testified that she fell asleep in the appellant's bedroom and awoke to find him having vaginal intercourse with her without consent.

The appellant claimed the complainant had consented, saying she initiated the sexual activity.

The trial judge rejected the appellant's evidence and convicted him.

On appeal, the appellant argued the trial judge reversed the burden of proof, misapprehended evidence, and failed to address the defence of honest but mistaken belief in consent.

The Court of Appeal upheld the conviction, finding no reversals of burden, no material misapprehension of evidence, and that the trial judge was not obligated to address the alternative defence given the complete rejection of the appellant's version of events.