Earlier in February of 2024, the Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC”) granted leave to hear the appeal of British Columbia Court of Appeal (“BCCA”) case R v Kinamore, 2023 BCCA 337 [Kinamore]. The appeal concerns the uneven scrutiny of competing evidence and the application of the s. 276 of Criminal Code, RSC 1985, c C-46 […]
The Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC”) will soon give direction to lower courts on how to assess the prejudicial and probative value of permitting an accused’s criminal record to be admitted as evidence. In R v Hussein, 2023 ONCA 253 [Hussein], the Court of Appeal for Ontario (“ONCA”) upheld the trial judge’s dismissal of the […]
The Court of Appeal for Ontario (the “ONCA”) has provided a sobering reminder about the importance of timely access to counsel. R v Whittaker, 2024 ONCA 182 [Whittaker] reinforces the notion that extended delays in accessing counsel will generally have an extensive impact on a detainee’s s. 10(b)-protected interests. In emphasizing the psychological benefits of […]
On February 22, 2024, the Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC”, or the “Court”) granted the Crown’s application for leave to appeal [40990] R v Wilson, 2023 SKCA 106 [Wilson]. The SCC’s decision will set a national standard regarding the limits of police powers to arrest and search a person who reports or remains at the […]
The Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC”) has granted leave to appeal the long and complex case of R v Pan 2023 ONCA 362 [Pan]. At trial, four co-accused – Jennifer Pan (“Pan”), Daniel Chi-Kwong Wong (“Wong”), Lenford Crawford (“Crawford”), and David Mylvaganam (“Mylvaganam”) – were all convicted of first-degree murder and attempted murder in the […]
In R v Zacharias, 2023 SCC 30 [Zacharias], a divided Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC” or the “Court”) held that evidence obtained through an unlawful detention cannot be used to ground a lawful arrest. Although Zacharias set a uniform national standard on this point, the SCC was anything but uniform in addressing the issue and […]
In a rare unanimous judgement, the Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC”) has ruled in R v Haevischer, 2023 SCC 11 (Haevischer) that only “manifestly frivolous” applications can be summarily dismissed in the criminal law context. The decision is significant for two reasons: (1) it arises out of the notorious “Surrey Six” case; and (2) it […]
The Ontario Court of Appeal (“ONCA”) applied the rapidly developing law surrounding the expectation of privacy in cell phones and police operations in R v Campbell, 2022 ONCA 666 [Campbell, ONCA]. The ONCA affirmed that people have a reasonable expectation of privacy in their text messages when the police legally seize any cell phone containing […]
Content Warning: The facts of the case involve the mention of child sexual abuse. In R v Chatillon, 2023 SCC 7 [Chatillon], the Supreme Court of Canada ("SCC") delivered a brief oral judgment re-visiting a case-by-case privilege in the context where a patient makes criminal admissions during the course of therapeutic treatment. A 6-1 […]
Is eyewitness testimony subject to a special standard of jury instructions? In R v Clark, 2022 SCC 49, the Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC”) upheld the need for trial judges to provide Hibbert instructions upon eyewitness testimony that leads to an identification in court. In a unanimous oral judgement delivered by Justice Karakatsanis, the court […]