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The Ontario Court of Appeal upheld a dangerous offender designation and indeterminate sentence for a man convicted of sexual offences against a child, and granted a sealing/redaction order for medical exhibits.
Offender convicted of aggravated assault which qualifies as a serious personal injury offence and the Crown's evidentiary record (recent pattern of unprovoked knife attacks aimed at victims' necks, temporal clustering of offences after release, prior robberies with imitation firearm, long history of convictions and breaches, substance addiction, prior psychiatric opinion of moderate-to-high risk, and in-custody violence and drug use) gives reasonable grounds to believe the offender might be found a dangerous offender under ss.753(1)(a)(i) and (ii); accordingly s.752.1(1) preconditions are met…
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The Court concluded the trial judge correctly applied the law, made fact findings amply supported by the record, permissibly admitted and relied on the Crown's expert and institutional evidence, reasonably found a pattern of repetitive and persistent violent behaviour and intractability (unable to surmount), and reasonably imposed an indeterminate sentence because there was no evidence of meaningful treatment within an ascertainable timeframe to protect the public; the appeal was dismissed.
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The Crown proved beyond a reasonable doubt that the accused committed a s.752 serious personal injury offence and that the offence forms part of an established pattern of repetitive and persistent aggressive behaviour demonstrating failure to restrain, a high likelihood of harmful recidivism and intractability; the evidence (including a comprehensive psychiatric/risk assessment placing him in the highest risk categories) did not establish a reasonable expectation under s.753(4.1) that any lesser measure would adequately protect the public; accordingly the accused is a dangerous offender and a…
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Court found Crown proved (beyond reasonable doubt) a repetitive pattern of bank/business robberies or attempted robberies by the accused occurring soon after release and tied to drug use and failure to restrain conduct, and that the predicate offence formed part of that pattern and there was a substantial risk of reoffending; however the Crown failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the pattern gives rise to a high likelihood of inflicting severe psychological damage on future victims, so dangerous offender designation could not be imposed; on the alternative long-term offender analysi…
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The court declared Jason Dirks a dangerous offender and imposed an indeterminate sentence, finding a high likelihood of future sexual and intimate partner violence.
The sentencing judge's misstatement that the psychiatrist 'recommended' an indeterminate sentence was immaterial because the psychiatric evidence, the offender's extensive violent record, poor treatment history, and actuarial assessments demonstrated a high risk of violent recidivism satisfying s. 753(1)(a) and leaving no reasonable expectation that a lesser determinate sentence with supervision would adequately protect the public; the record showed sufficient consideration of Gladue factors and no reversible error in the exercise of discretion, so the Dangerous Offender designation and indet…
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Appeal from an indeterminate dangerous-offender sentence was allowed only to set aside $600 in victim surcharges. The sentence was otherwise upheld.
The sentencing judge erred in principle by restricting the amicus appointment based on a misunderstanding of precedent (CLA); under Kahsai the judge could have and would have appointed amicus with broader adversarial functions to restore balance, and the resulting appearance of unfairness was sufficiently serious to set aside the dangerous offender finding and indeterminate sentence and order a new hearing.
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The appeal is allowed and habeas corpus granted because the sentencing judge ordered a psychiatric remand without invoking or applying the actual statutory authority (Mental Health Act s.21) and therefore acted without jurisdiction in that respect, and separately fettered his discretion by wrongly asserting he had no discretion to refuse a dangerous offender designation; those jurisdictional and fettering errors rendered the DO designation and the indeterminate sentence invalid. The appropriate remedy is to quash the DO-based detention and remit the matter to a different Superior Court judge…
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