Canada Case Law

R v Williams

Court

Nova Scotia Provincial Court

Given the gravity of intimate-partner sexual assault and the primacy of denunciation and deterrence, but having found significant mitigating factors (notably alcohol-use disorder reducing moral culpability, absence of prior violent record, stable community supports and manageable risk), the Court concluded a community-based punitive sanction (a 10-month conditional sentence order, adjusted to account for 11 months remand credit) was fit; concurrent sentencing applied to the sexual assault and assault counts while threats and breach counts were consecutive; ancillary orders (DNA, 10-year SOIRA…

Source excerpt

• Sexual assault
• Assault
• Uttering threats
• Breach of probation
• Conditional sentence order (cso)
• Remand credit

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R. v. Lee

Court

British Columbia Court of Appeal

Court of Appeal upheld a seven-year global sentence for drug trafficking and firearm possession, finding consecutive sentences were properly imposed and the sentence was fit.

• Consecutive vs concurrent sentencing
• Totality and proportionality
• Guilty plea mitigation
• Double-counting aggravating factors
• Fentanyl-related trafficking
• Criminal-sentencing

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R. v. Keats

Court

Nova Scotia Court of Appeal

The sentencing judge committed an error in principle by treating the timing of the BW offence as a bar to imposing a consecutive sentence; s.718.3(4)(a) authorizes consideration of consecutive service to a sentence being served at the time of sentencing irrespective of when the underlying offences occurred. The concurrent order was demonstrably unfit and the appropriate remedy is to order the 30-month sentence consecutive to the four-year sentence being served.

Source excerpt

• Consecutive vs concurrent sentencing
• Breach of trust
• Totality principle
• Section 718.3(4) criminal code
• Publication restriction s.486.4

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R. v. Chan

Court

Supreme Court of British Columbia

Sentencing after jury convictions for conspiracy to import cocaine. The court imposed a consecutive seven-year term on Chan and eight years on Singh, with DNA and weapons orders.

• Importation of cocaine
• Sentencing principles (denunciation, deterrence, proportionality, totality)
• Consecutive vs concurrent sentencing
• Aggravating and mitigating factors
• Sentencing
• Drug-importation

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R. v. Sherman

Court

Court of Appeal for Ontario

The Court upheld the conviction because admission of the N.I.K. evidence was appropriate, the jury was properly instructed that the N.I.K. was a superficial screen and that they must rely on lab certificates and accepted chain of continuity, and the jury was satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt as to continuity; the Court allowed the sentence appeal, finding it was improper to treat weapon possession as an aggravating factor on the importing charge and also impose a consecutive one‑year sentence, and therefore ordered the weapons sentence concurrent, leaving a total sentence of 12 years.

Source excerpt

• Importation of narcotics
• Chain of continuity
• Field test admissibility (n.i.k.)
• Possession/importation of weapon
• Consecutive vs concurrent sentencing
• Mandatory minimums

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