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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
In R v Metzger, 2023 SCC 5 [Metzger], the Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC”) upheld the acquittal of Shawn Metzger, who had been convicted of a number of offences arising from a home invasion robbery, on the grounds that the evidence in the case was circumstantial (Metzger, para 1). In the process, the SCC overruled […]
Introduction On September 1st 2022, after nearly eleven years of service, the Honourable Michael Moldaver retired from his post as Justice on the Supreme Court of Canada (“SCC”). This article will take a look at the illustrious career of Justice Moldaver, including his most noteworthy contributions to the SCC’s jurisprudence, while also applying a critical […]
In Barendregt v Grebliunas, 2022 SCC 22 [Barendregt], the Supreme Court of Canada ("SCC") examines the process by which new information can be introduced by the parties on appeal, specifically in the context of parenting relocation applications. Examining the various interests at play in a relocation application, the SCC ultimately concludes that finality is one […]
Serious Charter breaches risk undermining society’s confidence in Canada’s justice system. For this reason, courts have developed many comprehensive doctrines to guide police conduct in criminal investigations and to determine when the police have intruded too far into individual rights. In R v Beaver, 2022 SCC 54 [Beaver], the Supreme Court of Canada discussed four […]