Thomas Delbert Galligan

The appellant, a medical doctor, appealed his conviction for sexual assault against a patient during a breast examination.

The appeal was based on two grounds: inadequate jury instructions regarding the appellant's defence, and improper instructions to the triers during the challenge for cause based on racial bias.

The Court of Appeal allowed the appeal and ordered a new trial, finding that the trial judge failed to properly instruct the triers on their task and procedure.

The Court also noted significant deficiencies in the trial judge's failure to review the evidence supporting the appellant's defence that the examination was conducted for a medical purpose.

The appellant appealed the refusal of an application to transfer his first degree murder charge to the Youth Court.

The Court of Appeal found ample evidence to support the transfer judge's findings of fact and agreed that the appellant failed to show the public could be adequately protected under the Young Offenders Act disposition scheme.

The appeal was dismissed.

The appellant appealed his conviction and sentence for dangerous driving causing death following a retrial.

He argued that the trial judge erred in jury instructions regarding witness reliability, the use of his exculpatory statement, and legal causation.

He also raised issues regarding the Crown's failure to call a witness from the first trial and issue estoppel.

The Court of Appeal dismissed all grounds, finding no errors in the jury instructions, no abuse of process in the retrial, and no error in principle regarding the sentence.

The Crown appealed the respondent's acquittal on two counts of dangerous driving causing death.

The respondent lost control of his vehicle, striking a concrete pillar and killing two passengers.

The trial judge found the only evidence was excessive speed and, relying on R. v. Pezzo, concluded speed alone could not ground a conviction.

The Court of Appeal held the trial judge erred in law, clarifying that excessive speed can constitute dangerous driving depending on the context.

The acquittal was set aside and a new trial ordered.

The appellant was convicted of two counts of second-degree murder for killing her two young sons.

At trial, she instructed her counsel not to raise the defence of not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder (NCRMD) and refused to testify.

On appeal, she sought to introduce fresh psychiatric evidence that she was suffering from severe paranoid schizophrenia at the time of the offences and was incapable of appreciating the nature and quality of her acts.

The Court of Appeal admitted the fresh evidence, finding it met the Palmer criteria and that her decision at trial was a product of her untreated mental illness.

The court allowed the appeal, quashed the convictions, and substituted a verdict of not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder.

The Crown appealed as of right from a judgment of the Ontario Court of Appeal upholding the accused's acquittal on dangerous driving counts.

The Supreme Court of Canada dismissed the appeal, agreeing with the majority of the Court of Appeal that while there was evidence upon which a trier of fact could make a finding of dangerous driving, the failure to do so did not amount to an error of law.

The appellants, both sixteen at the time of the alleged offence, were charged with second-degree murder following a group assault.

They appealed a youth court judge's decision dismissing their applications to have the charges proceed in youth court rather than adult court.

The Court of Appeal upheld the youth court judge's findings that the appellants were a danger to the public and had not demonstrated they could be rehabilitated within the youth court disposition period.

The youth court judge was entitled to reject the appellants' psychiatric evidence because the experts were instructed not to discuss the circumstances of the offence with the appellants.

The appeals were dismissed.

The appellant appealed his sentence, arguing the sentencing judge erred by not imposing a conditional discharge.

The Court of Appeal found that the sentencing judge failed to consider the disparity between the appellant's sentence and his wife's conditional discharge for a related offence, and gave insufficient regard to the appellant's interests, including the loss of his livelihood as a chartered accountant due to travel restrictions.

The appeal was allowed, and given the passage of time, an absolute discharge was substituted.

The appellant, a bouncer, appealed his manslaughter conviction after punching an intoxicated patron in the head, causing a fatal fall.

He argued the trial judge erred in refusing to consider self-defence, finding causation, and that the verdict was unreasonable.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, finding no air of reality to the self-defence claim given the appellant was a trained, sober bouncer facing an intoxicated victim with his hands down.

The court also upheld the trial judge's findings on causation, noting medical evidence supported that the punch caused the fatal fall.

The Crown appealed the respondent's acquittal on charges of dangerous driving causing death and bodily harm.

The respondent, a young offender, drove through a stop sign at an allegedly excessive speed and collided with another vehicle, killing three people.

The trial judge found the stop sign was difficult to see and could not determine the exact speed, concluding the driving was a departure but not a marked departure from the standard of care.

The majority of the Court of Appeal dismissed the Crown's appeal, holding that the facts were disputed and the trial judge's conclusion did not amount to an error of law.

The appellant was convicted of attempted murder after shooting the victim in the back of the head outside a courthouse.

At trial, the appellant claimed he acted in self-defence, fearing the victim would attack him due to previous gang-related shootings.

The trial judge refused to leave self-defence to the jury and excluded expert psychological evidence regarding post-traumatic stress disorder.

On appeal, the Court of Appeal upheld the conviction, finding no air of reality to the defence of self-defence because there was no evidence of an imminent or reasonably apprehended attack at the time of the shooting.

The court also upheld the exclusion of the expert evidence and dismissed the sentence appeal, affirming the 8-year imprisonment term.

The respondent, charged with arson, brought a pre-trial motion for a stay of proceedings alleging abuse of process due to an insurance company's involvement in the criminal investigation.

The trial judge refused the stay but excluded wiretap evidence and ordered the Crown to pay approximately $150,000 in costs forthwith.

The Crown appealed the costs order.

The Court of Appeal held that the Crown had the right to appeal the costs order immediately under s. 676.1 of the Criminal Code.

The Court allowed the appeal and quashed the costs order, finding that the trial judge should not have determined the issue of costs or the abuse of process application until the conclusion of the trial, as the actual benefit of the exclusionary remedy to the defence could only be assessed at that time.

The Crown appealed the directed verdicts of acquittal of the respondents on charges of keeping and being inmates of a common bawdy-house.

The trial judge had acquitted the respondents based on Supreme Court of Canada decisions regarding acts of indecency.

The Court of Appeal held that the trial judge erred in law, as there was evidence that the respondents offered to perform acts of masturbation for payment, which a trier of fact could find constituted acts of prostitution.

The Court also found sufficient evidence of frequent or habitual use to pass the directed verdict stage.

The appeals were allowed, the acquittals set aside, and new trials ordered.

The appellant was convicted of causing death by criminal negligence after firing a rifle into a lake, resulting in a bullet ricocheting and killing a seven-year-old boy on the opposite shore.

At trial, the Crown introduced evidence from a police officer who conducted an experiment firing the appellant's rifle into the water to demonstrate how bullets ricochet.

The appellant appealed the conviction, arguing the experiment evidence was novel scientific evidence that failed to meet the Mohan criteria for expert opinion.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, holding that the officer's testimony was primarily factual observation rather than expert opinion, and was relevant, material, and properly admitted.

The appellant appealed his conviction and sentence for sexual assault against a 15-year-old complainant.

He argued the trial judge erred in assessing credibility, misapprehended evidence, and reached an unreasonable verdict.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the conviction appeal, finding the trial judge's credibility assessment careful and the verdict reasonable.

On the sentence appeal, the Court found that despite a potential error in principle regarding conditional sentences based on pre-Proulx case law, the sentence of one year imprisonment and two years probation was fit given the breach of trust and the complainant's age.

The appeal was dismissed.

The appellant argued that delayed and incomplete disclosure led to the loss of a 9-1-1 audio tape, compromising the ability to make full answer and defence.

The court held the police conduct was reasonable and the loss of the tape was entirely inadvertent, with its existence only becoming known at trial to all parties simultaneously.

Even assuming a Charter breach, the only remedy sought was a stay, which required proof of irreparable prejudice in one of the clearest of cases.

The court upheld the finding that no irreparable prejudice was shown and dismissed the appeal.

The appellant appealed both conviction and sentence after a jury convicted him of forcible confinement and acquitted him of break and entry with intent to commit an indictable offence and attempted kidnapping.

The Court of Appeal rejected arguments based on inconsistent verdicts, the admission of prior convictions on a Corbett application, and the admission of reply evidence regarding travel arrangements.

On sentence, the court held that the trial judge erred by treating the case as involving a plan to kidnap despite the jury's verdict.

The original five-year penitentiary sentence was found to be outside the appropriate range and was replaced with a sentence of two years' imprisonment plus three years' probation.

The appellant appealed both conviction and sentence following a jury trial for a sexual offence involving an alleged position of trust.

The court rejected challenges to the jury charge, including references to a non-existent letter, the instruction on position of trust, comments on the failure to testify, and the distinction between credibility and reliability.

The conviction appeal was dismissed because no prejudice was shown and the charge, read as a whole, was adequate.

The sentence appeal was allowed because the trial judge placed undue emphasis on the criminal record and the custodial sentence was disproportionate to the relatively minor factual circumstances of the offence.

The appellant challenged his conviction for operating a motor vehicle with an excessive blood alcohol level on the basis that police exceeded their authority under s. 48 of the Highway Traffic Act, resulting in arbitrary detention contrary to s. 9 of the Charter.

After a speeding and weaving stop, the officer directed the appellant from his vehicle to the police cruiser because of an overwhelming smell of cologne, uncertainty about the source of any alcohol odour, the presence of a passenger, and the officer's cold.

The Court of Appeal held that s. 48 authorized reasonable investigative steps at the roadside to determine whether grounds existed for a breath demand, and that the brief movement to the cruiser was minimally intrusive and reasonable in the circumstances.

The detention was lawful, the resulting evidence was properly admitted, and the appeal was dismissed.

The appellant appealed both conviction and sentence for breach of probation arising from the issuance and service of civil court proceedings against the complainants.

The court held that, given the substance of the statement of claim and the surrounding background, the proceedings were a communication with the complainants intended to further harass them, and therefore constituted a breach of the probation order.

The court also rejected an abuse of process argument based on the re-laying of the charge after a simple mistake, finding the procedure entirely appropriate.

The conviction appeal was dismissed, and leave to appeal sentence was granted but the sentence appeal was dismissed.