Stacey Diane Hamilton

The accused, Patrick O’Keese, was charged with second-degree murder and two counts of breach of recognizance.

The Crown alleged O'Keese murdered Brayden Moonias and then attacked Eric Lawson.

The court found that while an unlawful act caused Moonias's death, the Crown failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that O'Keese committed the assault.

The court found reasonable alternative inferences regarding the timing of the Lawson attack, which impacted the interpretation of O'Keese's post-offence conduct.

Consequently, O'Keese was acquitted of murder and manslaughter but convicted on both breach of recognizance counts.

The accused pleaded guilty to robbery involving an unprovoked, violent attack on the victim in which the accused and a co-accused beat the victim repeatedly, causing physical injury and significant emotional trauma.

The court imposed an eight-month custodial sentence followed by 12 months probation with conditions including abstinence from alcohol and drugs, anger management programming, restitution, and a curfew.

The court balanced mitigating factors including the accused's youth, lack of criminal record, early guilty plea, remorse, and supportive family background against the serious nature of the offence and the need for denunciation and deterrence.

The Crown sought to introduce a video-recorded statement from a deceased witness (S.D.) as hearsay evidence under the principled approach to establish the truth of its contents in a sexual assault trial.

The witness had observed events at his residence where the alleged assault occurred.

The court conducted a voir dire to determine admissibility.

While the Crown established necessity due to the witness's death, the court found that reliability could not be established.

The court identified significant concerns including the 24-day delay between the events and the statement, the possibility of collusion between the witness and the complainant, uncertainty regarding the witness's sobriety at both the time of the events and when giving the statement, and most critically, the witness's strong motive to fabricate evidence due to his affection for the complainant and disdain for the accused.

The court concluded that without the ability to cross-examine the witness on these critical points, sufficient trust in the truth and accuracy of the statement could not be placed.