Comment: I have been a criminal lawyer for over 20 years. I’ve rarely seen such a spectacle. Mr. Gowers spent 30 months in pre-trial detention and the judge said it was worth 4! The Crown’s office distorted the facts at the time of the guilty plea and wouldn’t back down when the errors were exposed.

It is often said the criminal justice system is cruel to the mentally ill. But this is really disturbing.

His crime was leaving some threatening voicemails on a public voicemail system for the Ombudsman’s Office. But half of them show he has delusions. He was treatable according to the court appointed expert. And showed remorse.

Read the article. Judgment is long. I can’t cut and paste at the moment.

Just… wow.

Article: https://www.law360.ca/ca/articles/2514140

Judgment: https://www.canlii.org/en/on/oncj/doc/2026/2026oncj473/2026oncj473.html

By Jennifer Pagliaro Crime Reporter

The Crown’s office has withdrawn murder and related charges against two men accused in the west Toronto shooting death of 15-year-old Jahkai Jack.

A third man is expected to have his charges withdrawn Wednesday afternoon.

Abdul Yeberebaba, 20 at the time of his arrest in Calgary earlier this year following a Canada-wide search warrant, had been charged with second-degree murder in the boy’s death and was being held in custody.

On Wednesday, in a Toronto courtroom, Crown attorney David Newton told Ontario Court Justice Rick Libman there was no longer a possibility of conviction in the case.

“The Crown, of course, has an obligation at all stages of the prosecution to continually assess both the public interest in the prosecution and it’s prospect of conviction,” Newton said. 

“Where that prospect of conviction is less than reasonable the Crown has an obligation to end that prosecution.”

Newton noted that Toronto police did a “thorough” investigation that included a “significant” amount of CCTV footage.

“But upon careful consideration of all the evidence available in this case and including a consideration of what evidence there still might be to come ... the Crown concludes unfortunately that it lacks a reasonable prospect of conviction in this case.”

Newton said the decision was difficult, especially considering the young age of the victim.

In the same courtroom, Jayden Samuel-James, 19 at the time of Jack’s death, had his charge of accessory after the fact to murder withdrawn with the Crown giving similar reasons.

Rajveer Gill, 21 at the time, had his charge of accessory after the fact to murder withdrawn Wednesday afternoon.

Jack and his friends were near Weston Road and Jane Street last June, possibly filming a music video, the lead detective said at the time, when they encountered another group.

“He was simply a young person meeting friends on a summer night,” Det.-Sgt. Phillip Campbell told reporters earlier. “His murder was a completely unprovoked act of violence that devastated his family.”

At the time, police emphasized that Jack had no connection to any criminal activity.

“He was just 15 years old and he had his whole life ahead of him,” Campbell said in July.

https://archive.ph/dsYFH

By Jacques Gallant Courts and Justice Reporter

A former York Region lawyer who maintained an “elaborate web of lies” for years by giving his clients fake court rulings while continuing to take their money has been sent to prison for three years. 

Ontario Court Justice Sandra Bacchus handed down the sentence for fraud and uttering forged documents late last month in a Newmarket courtroom, saying 52-year-old Adam White’s crimes had struck at the core of the justice system. In doing so, the judge went above the 22 months in jail requested by the Crown; the defence had asked for a conditional sentence, which is served in the community and typically involves a period of house arrest. 

“Mr. White’s actions exploited the vulnerability of a system of justice built on trust and integrity,” Bacchus said.

White, a former president of the York Region Law Association, was suspended by the Law Society Tribunal in 2023 and his licence was revoked the following year over the forgeries. 

He had provided a client who was suing for wrongful dismissal with fake documents including orders from a judge and an email from the opposing lawyer offering to settle, when in reality the case had already been dismissed without the client’s knowledge. 

In a second matter, White provided several fake judicial endorsements — complete with the purported signature of a real judge — while representing a man dealing with child custody issues; the man testified that he recalled receiving one of the endorsements at White’s Keswick office and that White told him the judge “appeared to be favouring his side.” 

The man’s mother had been covering his legal fees, and testified she paid White an initial $5,000 retainer fee followed by several payments totalling over $11,000.

In her judgment convicting White, Bacchus specifically found that a payment of $2,825 made by the mother to White in June 2022 at the lawyer’s request, for what White described as “future actions,” was money received “for court proceedings that had not occurred and were not scheduled” in 2022. In her July sentencing decision, Bacchus ordered White to pay that amount back to the mother as restitution. 

“Mr. White knowingly and repeatedly exploited the trust that these victims — his clients — placed in him, and their belief he was doing his job and working for them,” Bacchus said. “Mr. White’s actions represent a significant breach of trust.”

White, who has suffered from mental health issues throughout his life, told the court he regrets his actions and said his clients had been caught up in his “death spiral.” Bacchus found his expression of remorse to be qualified, however, as he continues to maintain his mental health struggles “are entirely to blame for his deceitful conduct.” 

In a victim impact statement presented to the court, the client from the wrongful dismissal case said it was a “devastating shock to the heart” to learn that not only were the rulings he had been given by White fake, but that his case had been dismissed years ago and he was in fact responsible for paying $8,000 in costs to the other side. 

“I had been duped for years,” the client said. 

He testified at trial he paid White between $15,000 and $20,000 to handle his wrongful dismissal lawsuit, and said he paid $7,000 after the case was dismissed without his knowledge in June 2019. In his victim impact statement, he said he received a judgment against White in small claims court, but that his lawyer has told him it will be difficult to collect it. 

The father from the child custody matter lamented that White’s actions had delayed the resolution of his case, as he was “forced to watch my children grow up through video calls.”

In one fake ruling from White, a judge purported to call out the mother for frustrating the man’s access to his children, and ordered that the Office of the Children’s Lawyer investigate the current views of the children to facilitate their father’s reintegration into their lives.

In reality, little to no work was being done to advance the father’s case of getting increased access to his children. 

“You only get one life, you only get one chance to experience your children growing up,” the father said. “That chance was taken from me and it is something I will never get back.”

Bacchus concluded that White’s “criminal deceitful actions” toward the father had “clearly played a significant role” in his estrangement from his children. 

“Mr. White worked against the interests of his own client, using barriers in the form of these false endorsements to keep him engaged as a client while impeding him from participating in the true court process.”

https://archive.ph/x62yT

Trial Judgment: R. v. White, 2026 ONCJ 27 (CanLII), <https://canlii.ca/t/khpbv&gt;

By Betsy Powell Courts Reporter

A Toronto judge told a convicted killer on Monday that he will face a life sentence with no chance of parole for 15 years, though that could change while a different judge decides if he should receive credit for being assaulted by jail guards at Maplehurst Correctional Complex in December 2023.

One possibility is that Lawrence Bruce could walk free, despite what Justice Peter Bawden described as the highly aggravating circumstances of him shooting an unarmed victim in a public place as he was fleeing. He was under a firearms prohibition stemming from an earlier gun‑possession case, which led to him spending a year in prison.

Bruce, 25, is one of at least 15 former Maplehurst inmates asking the court to stay their charges or reduce their sentences following an extraordinary court decision that has sent shock waves through Ontario’s justice system. Last October, Justice Clayton Conlan threw out first-degree murder charges against three men in order to denounce their treatment by jail guards, who meted out “vengeful” punishment after an inmate punched a guard.

Canadian courts have the power to reduce or even halt a prosecution when state misconduct becomes so serious that continuing with the case would bring the administration of justice into disrepute. 

The Crown is appealing Conlan’s decision.

But in the meantime, he is hearing evidence about what happened to other inmates, including Bruce, and what the “remedy” should be. Bruce’s lawyer, Gabriel Gross-Stein, said his client is asking that his second-degree murder charge be stayed. On Monday in a downtown Toronto courtroom, Gross-Stein told Bawden a decision is expected sometime this fall.

Last December, Bawden convicted Bruce of second-degree murder in the fatal shooting of aspiring Toronto rapper Dequan Demos after a chance encounter at a Scarborough gas station.

Demos, who performed as Dopeboy DQ, promoted his music through social media. Some of his songs contained insulting remarks about young men from the Malvern area who had been killed in acts of street violence. Demos identified with the Orton Park area, which had an ongoing rivalry with Malvern, the trial heard.

On the afternoon of Sept. 5, 2023, Bruce confronted Demos at the gas station about his disrespectful comments directed at his deceased friends. Things grew heated, and Demos placed his hand on his waistband in a manner suggesting he was carrying a gun. (He was not.)

Demos drove away in his Toyota sedan, his girlfriend beside him in the passenger seat watching TikTok videos on her phone. They were followed by Bruce driving a Range Rover. Less than two minutes later, Bruce fired a single shot from a 9 mm handgun through his open front passenger window, striking Demos in the temple and killing him. His girlfriend jumped from the still moving vehicle before it stopped at a tree.

At a trial last December, Bruce admitted he was guilty of manslaughter but not guilty of second-degree murder as he never intended to kill Demos. Bruce testified his purpose in firing the shot was to intimidate Demos, and stated he didn’t see him in the line of fire. He described the fact his bullet struck Demos in the head as “the worst coincidence.”

Bruce also testified he followed Demos in order to record a video of him fleeing and then post it online to show people he was a coward and not the tough gangster he portrayed himself to be in his music.

“The internet plays a big role in my generation. He’s an underground rapper. He’s trying to come up. He’s trying to start his music career. So if I can discredit everything he’s saying, I’ll take away that power that he has on social media and his music. His .. persona and his name is, essentially, ruined,” Bruce told his trial last year.

But that plan changed, he told court, because he believed Demos had called his armed associates to show up to assist him.

The judge rejected that as implausible.

“There were no associates of Mr. Demos present, and there was no imminent threat to Mr. Bruce,” Bawden wrote in his reasons for judgment. He presided over the case without a jury.

Under ordinary circumstances, Bawden said he would have imposed the automatic life sentence with a fixed parole ineligibility period of 15 years, starting at the day of Bruce’s arrest. He opted for that parole eligibility period due to Bruce’s relative youth, difficult background, family support and realistic prospects of rehabilitation.

However, because of the stay application being heard in a separate proceeding, Bawden adjourned the sentencing until his fellow judge decides if Bruce’s Charter rights were breached, and, if they were, whether to grant a stay or reduce his sentence.

If Conlan decides a stay is not warranted, he may recommend a reduction in sentence as an appropriate remedy.

“In that event, the matter will return before me for the imposition of a final sentence taking into account Justice Conlan’s factual findings and any recommendations he may make regarding a reduction in sentence.”

https://archive.ph/TiIwy

WARNING: This story references and contains details of child sexual assault.

Registered sex offender Daniel Senecal has pleaded guilty to multiple charges, including the sexual assault of a three-year-old girl in Welland, Ont., last year.

Senecal, 26, entered the pleas Tuesday in St. Catharines court, to charges of breaking and entering, aggravated sexual assault on a person under 16, sexual interference, assault by choking, failing to comply with probation and possessing child sexual abuse exploitation material.

Senecal was arrested on Aug. 31, 2025, after police were called to a home in Welland for "medical assistance call involving a child."

Niagara police said at the time that officers noticed upon arrival "the front door to the residence showing signs of having been forced open."

The identity of the girl is protected under a publication ban.

Senecal was known to the family

Justice David Andrew Thomas started Tuesday's proceedings by commenting on the number of people in attendance, CBC Hamilton heard in a court audio recording.

The case has garnered widespread community outrage, and calls for harsher sentences for sex offenders and criminal justice reforms across the Niagara Region. Bikers and supporters of a far-right extremist group have also taken part and led rallies demanding justice for the girl, prompting police to warn against "vigilante actions."

Since then, reforms to Canada's bail and sentencing system have become law, receiving royal assent earlier this month. Bill C-14, the Bail and Sentencing Reform Act, amends the Criminal Code, the Youth Criminal Justice Act and the National Defence Act to tighten the bail and sentencing framework across all three.

At the Senecal hearing on Tuesday, the agreed statement of facts were read in court.

Assistant Crown attorney Todd Morris said Senecal had been residing in a basement apartment for a few months next to the building where the toddler was living.

Senecal was roommates with someone who babysat the girl and a friend of the child's biological father, who was not living with the girl at the time of the assault.

Morris said Senecal met the girl's mother when she was pregnant. Senecal was also known to the girl, who would say hi to him, and had been seen playing with her and her sister, said Morris.

On the evening of Aug. 30, Senecal had several drinks and, sometime between 3 a.m. and 3:30 a.m. ET on Aug. 31, broke into the girl's home, said Morris.

Senecal was arrested later that morning in the backyard of his residence, the Crown lawyer said.

Morris described in detail the multiple, severe injuries that were inflicted on the child, which were discovered by her mother the morning of Aug. 31.

He said that, after the assault, she was taken to McMaster Children’s Hospital, where medical staff identified the injuries as consistent with use of force and strangulation.

Previous child sexual assault conviction

In 2024, Senecal was found guilty of what Justice Janet Booy described as the "violent" sexual assault of a 12-year-old boy in 2021. He served jail time and was released early in March 2025. He was also added to the National Sex Offender Registry for 20 years.

Senecal was on probation at the time of his crimes in August 2025.

Senecal had also been accused of assault in 2020, but the charges were withdrawn. In 2021, he was charged with mischief after damaging a surveillance camera at a Niagara Falls motel with a pellet gun.

Senecal's sentencing date in the Welland case will be set after a Gardiner hearing possibly in late July, if needed. Gardiner hearings are where evidence is presented to the judge on any aggravating or mitigating facts that the Crown and defence don't agree on.

While a Facebook page believed to be that of the accused last year used the name "Dani Senecal" and the pronouns "she/her," during the court process, including this week, Senecal was referred to as "Daniel Senecal" and court staff used he/him pronouns.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/daniel-senecal-pleads-guilty-9.7249986

By Betsy Powell Courts Reporter

A judge has stayed almost a dozen drug and proceeds of crime charges against a lifestyle and fitness coach after finding Toronto police officers “likely” stole $5,000 in cash from his Liberty Village apartment and lied about it under oath.

“I stress that this finding is made on a balance of probabilities, not using the standard of beyond a reasonable doubt,” Superior Court Justice Nancy Spies wrote in her ruling released last month. “This also means that at least one officer lied in giving evidence before me, which compounds the misconduct.”

The judge wrote she had “no choice” but to stay all his charges, “in order to denounce this misconduct and preserve the integrity of our justice system.”

Spies, however, rejected Jawad Shamim’s separate claim that police used excessive force during his arrest.

“Anytime a judge makes findings or critical comments about police conduct, an investigation will be conducted by our Professional Standards Unit,” Toronto police spokesperson Nadine Ramadan wrote in an email Wednesday. “We take judicial findings very seriously, and if misconduct is found, disciplinary action will be taken.”

One of the officers involved in the search has since quit policing and couldn’t be disciplined even if Toronto police suspected him of stealing the money. He told the preliminary inquiry in 2023 that he wasn’t getting paid enough and believes police officers are underpaid. He now works for a financial institution.

Shamim faced multiple Controlled Drugs and Substances Act and Criminal Code charges arising from an undercover drug investigation, including two cocaine trafficking counts from undercover purchases in April 2021.

Before his trial at the downtown courthouse, defence lawyer Anthony Moustacalis sought a stay alleging police used excessive force during the arrest, causing a serious ankle injury. After hearing days of evidence, including two with Shamim on the witness stand, the judge found his ankle sprain occurred during the takedown but it wasn’t the result of excessive force by arresting officers.

Moustacalis also sought a stay based on the allegation that officers stole $5,000 during the execution of a search warrant. 

After his arrest in May 2021, Shamim was held overnight and released on bail. He testified that when he went back to his one-bedroom unit at 59 Liberty Street, he found the drugs had been seized, but all of his cash was gone, including $5,000 in a laundry hamper and about $1,550 in a bowl in the kitchen.

Shamim testified his drug-buying clientele paid him in cash or by e-transfer. He kept the cash in a bowl on his kitchen counter, and would count it at night. When it exceeded $5,000, he would bundle the bills with a rubber band and hide it in a black garbage bag at the bottom of a laundry hamper in his bedroom closet.

He also told court he kept a handwritten “weekly log” of his drug transactions. The log for the week of his arrest listed paid-in-cash drug orders totalling $6,550 minus $100 to $200 for expenses. Police issued Shamim a property receipt for $1,340, which he accepted was accurate for money in the bowl.

In cross examination, Shamim denied prosecutor Victoria Rivers’ suggestions that he did not have the $5,000, that he made up the weekly log after reviewing his bank records, or that he altered the log. He testified he provided the log to his lawyer before he received disclosure and knew the amount of drugs and cash police had seized, “so it’s impossible I made the document up.” 

All of the officers involved in the search testified and all denied stealing any cash or observing anyone else stealing cash. They all said they would not do so, and that they would report such a theft to a commanding officer. The judge wrote in her ruling that it wasn’t clear from the evidence who searched where in the apartment, “because for the most part, the officers did not make notes of this.” 

Ultimately, the judge found Shamim, who had no criminal record, was “a convincing witness overall.”

Spies accepted Shamim kept a “weekly log” recording drug transactions and rejected the Crown’s argument that it had been fabricated after the arrest. She also concluded bank records generally supported the amounts shown in the log.

The court also relied on entry and exit videos of the apartment. Spies found they supported Shamim’s evidence that the laundry hamper was not being used for dirty clothes and there appeared to be a dark object consistent with a garbage bag at the bottom of the hamper.

Moustacalis, co-counsel with Aidan Seymour-Butler, said the problem of theft of cash by drug officers has been a recurring complaint for decades.

“The solution is to record the actual searches as they take place. This used to be done, sporadically, but isn’t now as the police say it might reveal the identity of undercover officers. With today’s technology this is not an excuse,” Moustacalis wrote in an email to the Star.

“The police were caught out here because defence records provided proof of funds, and the officers claim the hamper where the money should have been was full of clothes when it wasn’t, and their own post-search video showed no clothes on the floor at all. The judge was very alert to the details of the evidence and applied logic to the various stories and came up with a well reasoned decision.”

Paywall: https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/judge-finds-toronto-drug-squad-officers-likely-stole-5000-from-fitness-coach-stays-cocaine-charge/article_4c81c0b1-48f6-418a-a770-14f88d49931a.html

https://archive.ph/pjfTE

R. v. Shamim, 2026 ONSC 3902 (CanLII), <https://canlii.ca/t/km7n1&gt;

By Betsy Powell Courts Reporter

In November 2023, a judge ordered a Vaughan man to be detained after his ex-wife alleged he’d sent her threatening emails and Facebook messages.

“These allegations are frightening. The defendant has allegedly said that he will kill his former spouse and her children,” the Brampton jurist wrote.

From the outset, the man urged officers to investigate whether his former spouse had fabricated the messages to get him into trouble amid their acrimonious litigation.

“I definitely did not send anything like this,” he told a Peel Regional Police officer in a recorded statement shortly after his arrest. “I have proof, and witnesses for every word I am saying.”

But police and the Crown didn’t look into his claims. Not right away.

Instead, the man spent the next eight months locked up in one of Ontario’s most notorious jails, and more than a year after that living under strict bail conditions as his lawyer, Jonathan Weingarten, pushed police and prosecutors to investigate the source of the messages.

They did, finally, earlier this year and determined the messages indeed originated from accounts linked to the ex-wife’s phone number. On the eve of the jury trial in June, all the charges against him were withdrawn.

Investigators had years to look into this, Weingarten said, but “the Crown and police did nothing.”

Speaking to the Star, Toronto-area defence lawyers say the Vaughan man’s story is not an outlier; the court is seeing more and more cases where digital evidence that appears at first glance to be incriminating turns out to be unreliable or even manipulated.

The rise of deepfakes, AI-photo manipulation and other new technologies is “going to shake us out of our complacency,” Toronto defence lawyer Matthew Gourlay wrote in an email.

“The days of Crowns just putting in screenshots submitted by complainants and witnesses are probably coming to an end,” he wrote. “I don’t think the bar and the courts are ready for a new reality in which we can no longer believe our own eyes.”

Why the onus of proving a fake often falls on the defence

The Ontario Court of Appeal warned about the dangers of accepting digital evidence at face value back in 2021. The province’s highest court allowed an appeal because a trial judge failed to conduct a proper voir dire on the authenticity of electronic messages.

“This case demonstrates the risks associated with not paying adequate heed to the dangers that are associated with relying on text and other messages, absent expert evidence,” Justice Ian Nordheimer wrote in the decision. “Trial judges need to be rigorous in their evaluation of such evidence, when it is presented, both in terms of its reliability and its probative value.”

But there are practical realities.

Police digital forensic services have been backlogged even before the explosion of AI, given the preponderance of surveillance video, Ring camera footage, phone extractions, social media posts and other digital evidence involved in court cases, notes Toronto defence lawyer Chris Sewrattan. This means that someone charged with a criminal offence who wishes to challenge the authenticity of digital evidence before trial essentially has to prove its inauthenticity themselves.

“This requires hiring a private digital forensics firm and having them draft a report … This process is both time-intensive and expensive for the client.”

He has an example.

A woman claimed to have photographed Sewrattan’s client committing an indecent act outside her child’s elementary school in York Region. But a digital‑forensics review showed the images didn’t reliably depict him — and likely weren’t authentic. The charges were ultimately withdrawn.

“My client was a wonderful grandfather who was doing nothing wrong and was disgusted at the charges,” Sewrattan said.

Eight months in Maplehurst

So how to address this new reality?

Weingarten believes it starts with accountability.

Prosecutors don’t have to explain their reasons for dropping a case. The Brampton prosecutor nonetheless explained in an email to Weingarten that his client’s charges would be stayed over “credibility concerns” with the complainant.

For Weingarten, that’s not enough. His client spent eight months locked up in Maplehurst jail. That time included the height of the jail’s prisoner-abuse scandal, when guards carried out a “vengeful” collective punishment of nearly 200 inmates in December 2023 after an inmate punched a guard.

He also lost his job, blew through his savings, and, after his release and living under house arrest, developed psychological and various medical conditions, said Weingarten.

If nothing happens to the investigators and prosecutors who ignore repeated requests from a defendant to test the veracity of digital evidence, he wonders, then “why should they care?” The Crown does not conduct criminal investigations or obtain relevant evidence independent of the police investigation. However, Weingarten argues they are required to advise police if they receive relevant information from an accused person through their counsel.

He wants Peel police to charge his client’s ex-wife for duping the system. (Peel police did not respond to a request for comment on the case.)

The Star is not naming the warring ex-spouses as the man’s charges were stayed.

Asked by the Star in an email if she sent the threatening messages that resulted in her ex-husband’s incarceration, the ex-wife responded: “The case is closed and I don’t care.”

In an email, Peel Regional Police said the matter is currently under review. “As the review and related investigation remain ongoing, no further information will be provided at this time.”

‘We are going to have to be much more careful’

The new reality places heavy onus on judges to ensure a fair trial, especially when a self-represented accused disputes the authenticity of digital evidence, notes Gourlay.

He is co-author of a new edition of an evidence textbook that includes a “significant” update to the chapter on digital evidence. He included a quote by Justice Brock Jones, one of the book’s authors, who noted the vast majority of self-represented accused will lack the means to retain an expert of their own.

Police and prosecutors also have their work cut out for them, Gourlay believes.

While the potential has existed ever since electronic evidence of various kinds — text messages, emails, social media posts and digital video — became a regular part of trials, it’s rare for the spectre of fabrication to become an issue in court.

“Lawyers have often just put in screenshots of electronic content, without any meaningful forensic authentication,” Gourlay wrote.

“The law imposes a relatively low bar for authenticating electronic evidence, and again in most cases there’s no realistic dispute that the evidence is real.”

As the reliability of photos and videos becomes increasingly uncertain in the age of easy digital manipulation, the justice system is losing one of its most trusted forms of objective corroboration — a reliable check on the fallibility of human memory.

“That logic breaks down when there’s a realistic possibility the images themselves have been fabricated,” he continues.

“In this new reality, a witness’s credibility must be assessed before their photo or video can be trusted, reversing the traditional evidentiary hierarchy and introducing a layer of subjectivity into what used to be considered hard, corroborating evidence.”

Sewrattan, who wasn’t involved in the Vaughan man’s case, points to the pivotal 2015 Supreme Court of Canada decision that says when deciding whether someone’s detention is necessary, the court “must be careful not to play the role of trial judge or jury: matters such as the credibility of witnesses and the reliability of scientific evidence must be analyzed at trial, not at the release hearing.” 

“In this new digital age, however, there may be times where a bail court needs to dig through the weeds to find the just result,” he said.

Weingarten, who also practises family law, said Peel police’s refusal to investigate his client’s claims reflects the unintended consequences of Ontario’s mandatory‑charging policy, introduced in 1994 to govern police response to domestic‑violence complaints.

But the dangers run in both directions. Ontario courts have repeatedly confronted horrifying cases in which men released on bail for earlier assaults or threats against partners later killed them.

In July, Toronto police charged two men with murdering intimate partners after each had previously been arrested — and released — for allegedly committing violence against them.

And there is a valid concern that the constant threat of fake evidence will produce false alarms, “where we wrongly reject genuine evidence out of an excess of skepticism,” Gourlay wrote. 

Police departments and Crown offices are going to need to start devoting significant resources to “digital quality control,” he continued.

But neither should defence counsel be complacent, either by assuming that police will willingly shoulder this burden or by assuming they will do it reliably.

“We are going to have to be much more careful.”

Paywall: https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/an-ontario-man-was-jailed-for-eight-months-over-faked-facebook-messages-from-his-ex-wife-why-courts-are-struggling-to-spot-easy-fakes/article_8d8bb089-27f0-45c3-827f-fad133b6521b.html

https://archive.ph/6eDYM

By Lucas Casaletto

Posted July 30, 2026 12:48 pm.

 Last Updated July 30, 2026 12:49 pm.

A 13‑year‑old boy is facing multiple charges after police say he attempted to stab another youth during an altercation inside a McDonald’s restaurant in Oshawa.

Durham police were called to the McDonald’s at 2585 Thoroughbred Street around 7:50 p.m. on Tuesday, after reports of an armed person.

Investigators say a dispute between two youths escalated when the 13‑year‑old allegedly brandished a knife and attempted to stab a 16‑year‑old boy. The older teen managed to flee, and was not physically injured. The suspect left the restaurant before officers arrived.

Police located the 13‑year‑old at his residence a short time later and took him into custody without incident. Investigators then executed a search warrant at the home, where they recovered the knife believed to have been used in the attempted stabbing.

The Oshawa youth is charged with assault with a weapon, possess weapons dangerous and assault. He was held for a bail hearing.

The accused was not identified by means of the Youth Criminal Justice Act (YCJA).

Investigators are asking anyone with cellphone video, dashcam footage, surveillance recordings, or information to contact Durham police.

https://toronto.citynews.ca/2026/07/30/13-year-old-boy-charged-knife-attack-oshawa-mcdonalds/

By Jacques Gallant Courts and Justice Reporter

For much of his life, Christopher Wood avoided people and isolated himself to cope with his post-traumatic stress disorder and being triggered by loud noises. 

But in the summer of 2023, his isolation no longer protected him, a judge found, as the incessantly loud gospel sermons from his neighbour Etop Ituen’s balcony radio penetrated the walls of Wood’s supportive housing unit.

On the morning of July 27, 2023, Wood — who had no history of violence — walked over to Ituen’s building on Coxwell Avenue near Dundas Street East and, in a fit of “blind rage,” repeatedly stabbed the 61-year-old man to death in the backyard. 

On Wednesday, Superior Court Justice Maureen Forestell sentenced Wood, 70, to automatic life imprisonment with no chance at parole for 12 years, after Wood pleaded guilty last month to second-degree murder.

“The murder was exceptionally violent,” the judge said. 

Wood stabbed Ituen a total of 42 times. Crown attorney Brianne Bovell asked for a period of parole ineligibility of 14 years, highlighting the brutality of the killing and the fact that Ituen was a vulnerable victim killed in his own backyard. Defence lawyer Adele Monaco pushed for 10 to 12 years, pointing to Wood’s age and both his mental and physical illnesses, including diabetes, arthritis, and colitis. 

Wood and Ituen were living in neighbouring apartment buildings that were managed by an organization providing support for individuals with mental health issues. Wood had been complaining to his social worker about the noise coming from Ituen’s unit. He wrote his worker a note the day before the killing — which she only received the day of — in which he said the noise was “triggering great anxiety and panic in my psyche.” 

“It is also triggering great rage as, yet again, as has happened many times in my life, I am being victimized. I have developed very suicidal and conversely murderous feelings.” 

While psychiatrists concluded Wood did not meet the criteria to be found not criminally responsible due to a mental disorder, Forestell found that Wood’s various mental illnesses, including PTSD and depression, “significantly contributed to his loss of control” in killing Ituen. She also found that Wood did not plan to murder Ituen as he walked over to his building to confront him about the gospel radio; rather, it was a “spontaneous act driven by rage.”

The judge said Wood has had an “extremely difficult life”: he was abused by his mother growing up in Newfoundland, and after moving to Toronto in the 1970s, he was frequently admitted to hospital for psychiatric concerns. He developed addictions to cocaine and alcohol, struggled to hold down a job, and was unable to form relationships. 

Forestell concluded that incarceration will be more onerous for Wood “than a younger and healthier person sentenced for the same offence.” She noted he has already faced “deplorable” conditions while being held in pre-sentence custody at the Toronto East and Toronto South detention centres, including lockdowns and frequently sleeping on the floor near the toilet in a triple-bunked cell meant for two inmates. 

In a brief victim impact statement, Ituen’s nephew, Uby, said that while he tries to maintain a positive outlook on life, “this egregious act against my uncle tries every now and then to change who I am. I am not as patient with people as I used to be or would like to be.” 

Sitting in the prisoner’s box in his orange jail jumpsuit, Wood gently nodded on Wednesday as Forestell imposed the sentence. At a hearing last month, he had read a note to the court, blaming “government agencies that exist in order to prevent violent interactions between citizens” for failing to “function as advertised” in stopping the killing. 

“July 27, 2023, was a terrible day: a man had his life taken from him and another man lost his freedom,” Wood said. “Frustration and psychosis combined to create murderous rage, and there was no breathing space for sensibility or doing the right thing.” 

He said he hoped Ituen’s family “can one day find peace over the disappearance of their loved one, and understand that I, in my 70 years, have not been an individual of violence, but a victim of the same.” 

https://archive.ph/KzFoq

Formal ruling not on CanLII (yet)

By Jacques Gallant Courts and Justice Reporter

A man who lunged from the prisoner’s box and attacked a prosecutor in a Peterborough courtroom earlier this year apologized as he pleaded guilty to assault and received a 60-day jail sentence.  

“I’m sorry,” 30-year-old Matthew Dakin said at the July 15 hearing. “I’ve just been going through a lot.” 

The sentence was jointly proposed by Crown attorney David Moull and defence lawyer Ari Goldkind. It likely would have been longer if not for the fact Dakin is already serving a lengthy prison sentence for aggravated assault involving a stabbing, and will be subjected to a long-term supervision order for 10 years once he’s released. The 60 days will be served consecutively to his current prison sentence. 

“The only thing I would say is that anyone who is tempted to demonstrate their frustration by taking physical action against counsel on either side should not anticipate a sentence of only sixty days,” said Ontario Court Justice Faith Finnestad as she imposed the sentence.

“The consequences would be much higher.” 

Safety concerns raised about prisoner’s box

Dakin was shackled but not handcuffed on Feb. 17 as he sat in a prisoner’s box without a Plexiglas barrier, with a court officer on either side, during a hearing that ultimately led to him being declared a dangerous offender. 

As Crown attorney Kelly Eberhard — who had long expressed safety concerns about that particular prisoner’s box — was making legal arguments to the judge with her back to Dakin, the offender “became increasingly agitated” and then “essentially launched himself” out of the box, according to an agreed statement of facts presented at his guilty plea. He made contact with Eberhard’s left shoulder area before being quickly restrained by the officers. 

“Upon reflecting on what he did and how scary it would be for any lawyer in court to have this happen to them, Mr. Dakin stepped up and accepted responsibility for his terrible lapse in judgment,” Goldkind told the Star. 

‘This was so preventable’

It was one in a string of violent incidents involving Crown attorneys at Ontario courthouses, sparking calls for improvements to security. The Ontario Crown Attorneys’ Association said in a letter to Attorney General Doug Downey that they understood a Plexiglas barrier was quickly added to the box following the incident, even though concerns had been raised about it for a decade. 

“What makes me so angry about this is that this was so preventable,” association president Lesley Pasquino told the Star in February. “It’s unforgivable. It’s an absolute disgrace.”

Eberhard wrote in a brief victim impact statement that she’s repeatedly relived what happened and that it’s negatively impacted her sense of workplace safety. She said she can now empathize with victims and witnesses when they say, “it happened so quickly.” 

Moull, brought in from Newmarket to prosecute the assault case, called the incident “absolutely unacceptable” and “alarming.” 

As Goldkind put it: “This could have gotten a whole lot worse.” 

https://archive.ph/OJi7I

By Betsy Powell Courts Reporter

A woman who used stolen credentials and fabricated documents to obtain nursing positions at several Toronto-area long-term nursing homes has pleaded guilty to fraud.

Anh Nguyen, 32, impersonated registered nurses after appropriating registration numbers of real nurses to support her false claims. Her employment history began in June 2020 — a few months into the COVID-19 pandemic — and ran until November 2024.

During that time, she worked at Villa Santa Maria in Vaughan, Silverthorn Care Community in Brampton, and Nisbet Lodge, Ina Grafton Gage and Tendercare Nursing Home in Toronto.

Nurses are required to monitor residents’ health, note changes in condition and assess the need for referrals to doctors, and process and implement physicians’ orders. At one of the facilities, Nguyen oversaw five personal support workers and managed the direct care and medication of 31 residents, which included administering such medications as insulin injections.

“There was risk to the residents and the operation of the various long-term care homes as Ms. Nguyen, not a registered nurse, provided direct care to residents, interacted with families, administered medication, trained and directed subordinate medical personnel, and had access to personal health information without the proper qualifications,” Crown attorney Matthew Shumka said, reading from an agreed statement of facts in a downtown courtroom Tuesday.

Ontario’s long-term-care homes saw the worst effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, including extended lockdowns, waves of outbreaks, hundreds of deaths among vulnerable residents, and serious illness among overworked staff.

Nguyen’s first job was at Villa Santa Maria, though it went by another name at the time. It was one of the worst-hit Ontario homes where the Armed Forces were called in over out-of-control outbreaks during the pandemic’s deadly first wave.

Nguyen also worked as an assistant director of care at one of the facilities, a role for which she was paid $94,000 annually. Her job entailed interacting with senior management to plan, organize, and co-ordinate resident medical care within approved policies and procedures.

When she applied for that position by email, “she indicated her desire to pursue a full-time management role in long-term care and referred to herself as a hardworking and fast learner nurse,” Shumka told Ontario Court Justice Ferhan Javed.

The College of Nurses of Ontario (CNO) initiated an investigation after receiving a complaint that Nguyen was on staff at Ina Grafton Gage, yet her employment profile indicated she worked at a downtown hospital. The CNO contacted the victim — a nurse with a similar name — and advised her that she should file a report to police while the CNO investigation continued.

In June 2024, that nurse filed a report with the Toronto Police Service. A fraud investigation commenced, revealing Nguyen’s work history based on documentation that she fraudulently obtained.

The agreed facts did not delve into how this was allowed to happen, but noted one employer overlooked “notable discrepancies” in two resumes she submitted, while another employer did not require her to complete an interview for the nursing position. When she did interview at another long-term-care home, Nguyen lied about her education credentials, what she learned about acute medical care and having amassed significant experience in managing medical staff.

After her arrest in May 2025, Nguyen admitted to police she had worked at Ina Grafton Gage but denied other employment roles.

Nguyen was born in Russia in 1993 and is a Vietnamese citizen. She moved to Canada in 2016, completed educational programs at Humber College, and is currently being sponsored for permanent residency.

Her lawyer did not respond to a request for comment. A sentencing hearing is set for February.

https://archive.ph/OvxAM

A mentor convicted of sexually assaulting a university student and threatening to send sex videos to her family in Iran has been sentenced to three years in prison after Ontario’s highest court overturned his light conditional sentence.

But lucky Yasser Ghoreishi won’t actually have to do any time behind bars after all.

The Court of Appeal ruled the 20-month conditional sentence imposed in 2024 for sexual assault and assault was “demonstrably unfit” for such a serious offence but didn’t want to send him to prison now that he’s completed his conditional sentence.

“In the circumstances, it is not in the interests of justice that he be reincarcerated. This court is generally reluctant to reincarcerate an offender who has already served the sentence originally imposed,” wrote Justice Darla Wilson on behalf of the three-judge panel.

“Imprisoning Mr. Ghoreishi at this point would merely serve to disrupt his employment and housing and hinder his rehabilitation.”

What a horrible message that sends.

After coming from Iran in hopes of attending Laurentian University, the complainant was connected to Ghoreishi, a Laurentian post-graduate student and an Iranian national, through a family friend. He became a mentor to her and advised her to come to Sudbury for a few days to check out the university. On her last night there, she said he forced her into sexual intercourse and videotaped the encounter.

She stayed in contact with him and they agreed to forget about what happened.

In March 2020, Ghoreishi, introduced her to a suitor identified only as S.M. but continued to demand sex from her under threat that he’d divulge the sex tape he recorded in Sudbury. When she tried to leave the room, she said he hit her hand and on another occasion, slapped her during sex.

Threatened to ‘crush’ victim and suitor

After the third and final incident in May 2020, the complainant and S.M. decided to cut the controlling Ghoreishi out of their lives and in return, he threatened to “crush” them. A few months later, S.M.’s friend received an anonymous letter accusing the complainant of lying about her virginity and threatening to send naked photos and videos. The friend gave the letter to S.M., who confronted his girlfriend. She finally disclosed that Ghoreishi had been blackmailing her into sex.

She then reported him to the police.

At his trial, Ghoreishi claimed it was all consensual. Originally charged with four counts of sex assault, two of assault and one of unlawful confinement, a jury convicted him only on one count of sexual assault and one of assault. The Crown asked for a three- to four-year prison term; Superior Court Justice Rita Jean Maxwell sentenced him to a 20-month sentence to be served at home.

On appeal, the court upheld Ghoreishi’s convictions but agreed with prosecutors that he should have gone to prison, with the usual range being three to five years for sexual assault involving penetration.

“Conditional sentences will rarely be appropriate in these cases,” Wilson wrote.

“Mr. Ghoreishi’s offences are serious. The jury’s verdict reflects that the appellant was found to have threatened the complainant, forcing her to have sex with him under duress, while also assaulting her. Mr. Ghoreishi took advantage of the complainant’s vulnerability as a new immigrant to Canada and betrayed the trust she had placed in him for his own sexual gratification. As reflected in her victim impact statement, and accepted by the trial judge, the offences had a significant impact on the complainant, leading her to be fearful and distrustful of physical contact and to harbour insecurities about her relationship with her now-husband, S.M.”

The court substituted a three-year sentence and then promptly stayed it.

“In this case, the principles of denunciation and deterrence may be adequately addressed through allowing the sentence appeal, denouncing the sentence originally imposed, substituting the sentence that ought to have been imposed, but staying execution of that sentence.”

But how in the world is letting him off the hook adequate denunciation?

Article: https://torontosun.com/news/local-news/appeal-court-sentences-ontario-rapist-to-prison-but-wont-send-him-there

Decision: R. v. Ghoreishi, 2026 ONCA 508 (CanLII), <https://canlii.ca/t/km0z4&gt;

Chamberlain J.:

[1]         Jasmine Dedam is a First Nations woman from Elsipogtog First Nation, a Mi’kmaq community on the east coast of New Brunswick. She pleaded guilty on May 9, 2025, to two charges: aggravated assault and assault causing bodily harm. 

...

Aggravated Assault (November 3, 2024)

[3]         Jasmine Dedam, Krystyne Meeches, and Melina Bone were staying at a shelter when they decided to take a break and checked into a hotel. On November 3, 2024, they booked a room at a Holiday Inn on Dixon Road and began drinking alcohol. Krystyne Meeches made a comment about the other two getting “smoochie,” which the others took as a homophobic remark and found offensive. Jasmine Dedam grabbed Ms. Meeches by the hair and began punching and kicking her. She also grabbed the phone in the room and began beating Ms. Meeches with it.

[4]         Melina Bone tried to intervene and was punched in response. 

[5]         As a result of this severe beating, Krystyne Meeches lay on the floor seemingly unconscious. They threw a sheet over her and left her there overnight. By 8 a.m., she began vomiting blood. An ambulance was called, and she was transported to the hospital. Ms. Meeches had a fractured nose and ribs, along with cuts. She was diagnosed with a fractured orbital bone, hemorrhaging behind an eye, and multiple cuts. 

[6]         The nature and extent of these injuries are consistent with prolonged, forceful violence. Jasmine Dedam has acknowledged responsibility for the assault and has admitted to consuming significant amounts of alcohol. I am satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt that the assault caused wounding and maiming within the meaning of the Criminal Code and therefore constitutes aggravated assault.

Assault Causing Bodily Harm (December 5, 2024)

[7]         On December 5, 2024, the complainant, Catherine Corbett, had known Jasmine Dedam for approximately one week prior to the incident. At approximately 10:30 a.m., Ms. Dedam attended Ms. Corbett’s residence, where a verbal dispute arose. During the dispute, Ms. Dedam struck Ms. Corbett in the face with punches, prompting Ms. Corbett to call for help. Jasmine Dedam then placed her hands around Ms. Corbett’s neck, impeding breathing. Jasmine Dedam also placed fingers into Ms. Corbett’s mouth during the assault. Police were later called to the scene.

[8]           As a result of the incident, Ms. Corbett sustained injuries, including a broken nose and a cheek laceration. I am satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt that Jasmine Dedam intentionally applied force to Ms. Corbett without consent, and that this force caused bodily harm.

Victim Impact Statements

Krystyne Meeches

[9]         Krystyne Meeches’ statement describes a devastating, permanent transformation in her life after a brutal assault that left her with severe physical injuries and lasting psychological trauma.

[10]      Emotionally, she explains that the incident has fundamentally altered her sense of safety and trust in others. She describes living in a constant state of fear and hypervigilance, stating: “It affected my whole life. Not able to trust anybody. Feeling scared to go out… I’m always looking over my shoulder thinking someone’s going to attack me.” This fear is persistent and deeply ingrained. Ms. Meeches acknowledges that the sense of terror is unlikely to dissipate: “I still have the scared feeling in myself and I know that won’t go away any time soon.”

[11]      The physical consequences she describes are severe, life-altering, and ongoing. Ms. Meeches reports that she was abandoned after the assault in critical condition: “I was left on the floor with a sheet over me to die. No one called 911, they left me there over night.” She suffered serious brain trauma, including bleeding and long-term damage: “I get seizures because of the brain trauma I incurred… I could go into a seizure at any time and this is the life that I have to live now.”

[12]      Her recovery has required extensive medical intervention and rehabilitation. She had to relearn basic functions: “I went to a rehabilitation centre to learn how to walk again and talk again” and continues to live with lasting impairments, including vision damage: “My left eye will never be the same… the eyesight will never be the same.” She also describes changes to her speech and physical presentation, noting that she now stutters and experiences involuntary movements, contributing to an altered self-image: “I look at myself in the mirror [and] I see a whole different person.”

[13]      Financially, the assault created significant burdens from recovery-related expenses. Ms. Meeches reports she incurred additional costs for assistive devices and care, including a walker, a cane, specialized footwear, medical supplies, and an emotional support dog recommended by her doctor.

[14]      Overall, Krystyne Meeches’ account portrays a survivor living with permanent neurological injury, significant physical impairment, and persistent psychological distress, while relying heavily on family support to cope with the aftermath.

Catherine Corbett

[15]      Catherine Corbett explains that the trauma has fundamentally changed her, stating: “She also killed an emotional part of me that day… A part of me died.” Her account of the assault underscores the severity of the violence. The psychological aftermath has been severe and persistent.

[16]      Ms. Corbett describes daily anxiety, panic attacks, and an inability to feel safe or resume normal activities. She notes that “my trust in humanity has been shattered” and that she now avoids community spaces and social activities, leading to isolation.

[17]      Physically, Ms. Corbett continues to suffer from significant, ongoing medical issues. She reports post-concussion syndrome with chronic symptoms including “focus, balance, chronic headaches, and migraines,” as well as damage to her throat and a broken nose. She required hospital treatment, diagnostic imaging, and ongoing care, and remains under the supervision of multiple medical professionals. These injuries have had lasting effects on her ability to function, including her capacity to work: “I have not returned to my regular work duties… I have issues concentrating, focusing… dizziness, and nausea.”

Background

[18]      Jasmine Dedam, a 33-year-old Mi’kmaq woman from Elsipogtog First Nation in New Brunswick, is a registered Status Indian. Her family history is deeply influenced by colonial policies that targeted Indigenous peoples in Canada. Many relatives, including her grandmother and several aunts and uncles, attended the Indian Residential School system and Indian Day Schools.

[19]      These institutions' impact extended across generations. Ms. Dedam’s grandmother, a survivor of residential schools, experienced sexual violence and lifelong trauma. An uncle who also attended residential school later died by suicide. Her father, a Sixties Scoop survivor, was removed from his family as a child and placed in foster care, where he encountered racism and neglect. Both parents carried unresolved trauma, influencing their parenting: her father battled addiction and anger, while her mother was frequently physically and emotionally abusive.

[20]       Jasmine Dedam’s childhood was marked by instability, violence, and exposure to widespread sexual abuse within her extended family. Her connection to her Indigenous culture was minimal, shaped by the impact of residential schooling and her mother’s religious beliefs, which discouraged traditional practices. During her youth, she also faced racism at school and, after coming out as a lesbian at 16, encountered homophobia from peers and family, which led to her being banished from her home.

[21]      These shared experiences, such as intergenerational trauma, family violence, cultural disconnection, racism, and social marginalization, led to early substance use, mental health issues like PTSD, depression, and anxiety, as well as instability in education, work, and relationships.

[22]      As an Indigenous woman in an urban setting, she later faced heightened vulnerability to poverty and homelessness, issues that disproportionately affect Indigenous populations due to structural inequalities rooted in colonial history.

[23]      Jasmine Dedam’s criminal conduct occurred in the context of heavy alcohol use, unresolved trauma, and triggers rooted in past experiences, particularly homophobia and violence. The report emphasizes that while she accepts responsibility, these actions cannot be understood in isolation from the systemic and historical disadvantages associated with her Indigenous identity.

[24]      Her recent engagement with Indigenous healing services, sobriety, and cultural reconnection highlights the importance of culturally appropriate responses to both her rehabilitation and broader systemic inequities.

[25]      Disappointingly, I received a letter dated April 16, 2026, stating that despite some good work since her admission to the Thunder Woman Healing Lodge on August 13, 2025, and participation in structured programming focused on personal goal setting, stabilization, and preparation for reintegration into the community, she was discharged on April 8, 2026. She was provided with housing through a multifaith housing agency and would receive limited support from the Thunder Woman Healing Lodge. 

...

The Position of the Parties

Crown Position

[44]      The Crown is seeking a total sentence of five years’ imprisonment, with four years for aggravated assault and one year for assault causing bodily harm. They base this request on both the details of the offences and Jamine Dedam’s background, noting that she is relatively young with a criminal record. The crimes involve two notably violent and serious beatings that inflicted significant harm on an Indigenous victim, Krystyne Meeches. The Crown argues that this level of violence is among the most severe, short of murder, and should heavily influence the sentencing decision.

[45]      The Crown emphasizes that the core goals of sentencing, including upholding respect for the law, deterrence, denunciation, separating offenders when necessary, rehabilitation, reparations, and recognizing the harm caused, must all be considered. However, in cases involving serious violence, deterrence and denunciation take precedence. The severity of injuries and their long-term effects on the victim demand a sentence that unmistakably expresses society’s condemnation and assures both the victim and the public that justice has been achieved. Although other sentencing principles remain relevant, the Crown argues that any approach that diminishes the importance of deterrence and denunciation in these situations would be a mistake.

Defence Position

[46]      Counsel argues that Jasmine Dedam has already spent a significant eight months in custody, amounting to a substantial deprivation of liberty. They stress that this pre-sentence detention should carry meaningful weight in the pursuit of a just and proportional sentence. Furthermore, the defence points out Ms. Dedam’s notable rehabilitative potential, evidenced by her progress and conduct at the Lodge, as well as her previous behaviour indicating she can benefit from structured support. It is also contended that her custodial experience has been especially challenging.

[47]      Ms. Gensey, in essence, conceded the need for incarceration, but argued that a term of incarceration in the reformatory range, given the mitigating personal circumstances, would be more appropriate.

...

Conclusion

[84]      I accept that the four-year sentence sought by the Crown on the aggravated assault and one year on the assault causing bodily harm falls within the range of sentences for aggravated assault, particularly in cases involving catastrophic injury, as was inflicted on Krystyne Meeches because of the assault. I recognize that Krystyne Meeches, as an Indigenous woman, is particularly vulnerable, and I note the need to place a prominent focus on deterrence and denunciation in sentencing Jasmine Dedam. I also accept that the assault causing bodily harm to her short-term domestic partner, Catherine Corbett, which resulted in serious injury and significantly affected her physically and emotionally, is seriously aggravating. 

[85]      But it is incumbent on me to also consider both the systemic factors and the background that Jasmine Dedam experienced. Both sides of her family experienced Indian Residential Schools or Day Schools, resulting in significant intergenerational trauma, including neglect and violence, religious bigotry imposed by Christian beliefs, and the loss of cultural traditions. This trauma led to her being disowned by her family when she came out in her teens. 

[86]      She also faced significant racism and hatred in the broader community when she attended school off reserve, compounding the violence and struggles she faced at home. She began to cope with these stressors by drinking alcohol and was later diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and major depression.

[87]      I also recognize that she has made significant progress in her rehabilitation, having engaged in treatment for about eight months. At the time of sentencing submissions, she had been sober since December 2024. However, the circumstances surrounding her discharge from the Thunder Woman Healing Lodge have tainted her prospects. This is not aggravating in and of itself, but it does diminish the impact of her rehabilitative steps as a mitigating factor.

[88]      I am also mindful that, as an Indigenous lesbian woman, Jasmine Dedam has been a victim of violence, racism, and homophobia, as the Gladue report makes clear. It is a burden she bears as she now faces the repercussions of her actions in inflicting violence against two women, one a domestic partner and the other a vulnerable Indigenous woman who is now seriously damaged by Ms. Dedam’s actions. 

[89]      Our criminal justice system has failed Indigenous victims and offenders. That truth is undeniable. It’s also crucial to remember that, despite our efforts in the Toronto Gladue Court to address the cultural needs of the Indigenous community through practices such as smudging, creating space for and incorporating ceremonies when appropriate, and showcasing Indigenous art in our environment, this is not Indigenous Justice. The tools we use are the same as those we have always relied on, found in the Criminal Code. We are simply trying to approach things differently, to make justice more meaningful, respectful, and kind.

[90]      I believe it is safe to say that if Indigenous people were designing their own justice system, it would look very different from what we are doing now. I long for a criminal justice system that allows for restorative justice alternatives or programs that mandate and support people in making real efforts to heal themselves, whether as victims, offenders, or community members. Land-based programs that support traditional cultural practices by acknowledging and healing the harm of colonialism and that help restore participants and communities to a safer place, where people can accept responsibility and be liberated from their traumas in a safe and secure manner. Culturally appropriate programs that truly work to ensure they can realistically avoid facing the same harm and actions that led them to have to face justice in the first place.

[91]      However, we are bound by the criminal justice system we have, by the Criminal Code, and by the precedents of our courts. In those circumstances, and for the reasons noted above, notwithstanding my acknowledgment of the harm that incarceration may cause you I find that I must impose a period of incarceration. As stated in paragraph 31 of Rabbit, when it comes down to imposing a sentence for these offences, I cannot ignore the seriousness of the offences and the harm done to the victims.

[92]      I recognize that I am adding yet another Indigenous woman to the custodial population, increasing the over 50% representation of Indigenous women in custody in Canada even though Indigenous people are but 5% of the population, according to Statistics Canada[1].

[93]      In the circumstances of this case, considering the harshness of the violence and the decidedly cruel decision to leave Krystyne Meeches lying on the floor, covered in blood and seriously injured, and just throwing a sheet over her so she could continue drinking, on the aggravated assault, I will impose a sentence of 2 ½ years. For the assault causing bodily harm against Catherine Corbett, I will impose a sentence of 8 months, consecutive, for a total sentence of 3 years, 2 months. I note that you have spent 254 days in pre-trial custody. Summers credit would bring that to 380 days, or 1 year and 15 days. I will grant you a further 45 days of Duncan credit for the ongoing crisis in provincial institutions, which has led to frequent lockdowns due to staff shortages. These lockdowns severely limit access to programming and yard time, making pre-trial custody significantly harsher. 

[94]      The remaining time in custody will be 2 years. There will also be a DNA order, which is primary, and a section 109 for 10 years.

...

R. v. Dedam, 2026 ONCJ 409 (CanLII), <https://canlii.ca/t/km264&gt;

By Jacques Gallant Courts and Justice Reporter

Ryan Williams was a balcony surfer.  

The 38-year-old man would climb from one balcony to another at his apartment building on Church Street near Shuter Street as well as at previous residences; he once scaled down the outside of a building — approximately 10 storeys — after climbing over a balcony. 

But on April 24, 2024, Williams lost his grip and fell to his death from his eighth-floor unit as he tried to flee his apartment after being threatened by Joshua Pilgrim, an acquaintance, during a physical fight with another man. 

Pilgrim pleaded guilty to manslaughter on Wednesday, admitting that he knew Williams might try to escape from him via the balcony “given his knowledge of Mr. Williams’ predilection for balcony surfing,” according to an agreed statement of facts. 

“Mr. Pilgrim admits that his unlawful act of threatening Mr. Williams with additional violence was a contributing cause of his death.” 

Crown attorney Nathaniel Smith is expected to argue that Pilgrim, who has been in jail since his arrest, should receive a five-year sentence minus standard credit for pre-sentence custody; defence lawyer Scott Reid will ask for three to four years. 

Williams lived at the Church Street apartment with his mother, who was in her bedroom on the day he died. Four people — two women and two men, including Pilgrim, the only person charged in Williams’ death — showed up looking to get back cases of Ensure nutritional supplement drinks that Williams had stolen from one of the women.

Pilgrim was familiar with Williams, who suffered from a drug addiction, as they sometimes used drugs together. Pilgrim was also there that day to get back drugs he believed Williams had taken from him when he slept over a few weeks prior. If Williams had already used the drugs, Pilgrim wanted an amount of money equivalent to their value. 

A fight ensued in the living room between Williams and the other man in the group over the stolen Ensure; the man punched Williams several times. Meanwhile, the two women stood between the entry to the living room and the door to the apartment. 

“While not intentional, they were inadvertently blocking Mr. Williams’ exit from the apartment during the confrontation,” says the agreed statement of facts. 

Pilgrim then threatened Williams during the fight, though he can’t remember the exact words he used. 

“He admits they were of a threatening nature in which he would use violence against Mr. Williams if Mr. Williams did not pay Mr. Pilgrim the money for the drugs he took from him,” says the statement. 

“Uttered while Mr. Williams was engaged in a violent altercation, it caused him to believe that Mr. Pilgrim was about to enter the fray, which caused (Williams) to panic and try to escape.” 

Williams ran out to his balcony and tried to climb over to another. 

“However, owing to panic and/or a combination of illegal drugs in his system at the time of the incident, he lost his grip and fell,” says the agreed statement. 

Williams landed on scaffolding on the second floor and died of his injuries. Pilgrim and the others then fled the scene and returned to their tent encampment. He was arrested two days later and charged with second-degree murder, which was later downgraded in court to manslaughter. 

During a preliminary hearing in provincial court, where a judge determines if there’s sufficient evidence to move the case to trial in Superior Court, Pilgrim had his cellmate at the Toronto South Detention Centre call one of the women who had been in Williams’ apartment to ensure she testified at the hearing that there had been no physical altercation between Williams and Pilgrim. 

While that may have been true, Pilgrim admitted on Wednesday that by asking the woman to “provide specific testimony about his actions,” he also committed the offence of attempting to obstruct justice. 

The Crown and defence disagree on one issue that could be used as an aggravating factor in determining a fit sentence: Smith alleges that Pilgrim swung a “bladed weapon” at Williams and cut through his hoodie, but didn’t make contact with his body. The defence will argue that didn’t happen. 

Superior Court Justice Maureen Forestell will deliver her decision on that point and on sentencing at a later date. 

https://archive.ph/mKEkm

By Betsy Powell Courts Reporter

On June 25, 2024, a team of Toronto police officers drove to a Whitby neighbourhood with a narrow mandate: arrest Trayvon Palmer “if the right circumstances presented.”

They suspected he had breached the conditions of a release order for a firearms offence. But there was no urgency. The plan was to move in only if they could arrest him quickly and safely, and only if they could make unmistakably clear he knew they were police officers.

What followed was the antithesis of the safe, controlled takedown police are taught to execute.

One of the officers intentionally steered his unmarked vehicle into Palmer and Paul Lewis as they travelled on an e‑scooter, a “violent” collision that sent both men airborne. Seconds later, another officer rammed his vehicle into Lewis — after he stopped to retrieve a gun.

The chaotic scene was captured by security cameras; the fallout has now led to a gun being tossed as evidence, Palmer and Lewis walking free, and the conviction of a Toronto police officer for assault. 

Earlier this year, the court heard that Palmer had been taunting people online, in addition to being wanted for breaching his bail.

That day, four Toronto plainclothes officers, each driving an unmarked vehicle, waited outside a residence until just after 6 p.m., when Palmer emerged with Lewis, who was unknown to the team. The two climbed onto an electric scooter and rode toward a nearby plaza at 411 Garden Street anchored by a Canadian Tire. The team followed from a distance.

Police approach leads to chaotic incident

What happened next unfolded “by committee” as there was no dedicated lead officer and communication was poor, Justice Katrina Mulligan said Monday at the downtown Ontario Court of Justice.

When Det.-Const. Jeremy Samson radioed that the plaza might be a good location to arrest Palmer. Const. Joshua Baksh interpreted the message as a “takedown signal,” the judge said.

In the surveillance video, Baksh can be seen accelerating his unmarked vehicle directly into the moving scooter. (Samson testified he had been misinterpreted and he meant it as a question, but agreed after hearing the recording in court it sounded like a statement.)

The collision was “quite violent,” said Mulligan, and without “apparent justification.” In the footage, Palmer can be seen striking the windshield before he and Lewis land metres away.

They scramble to their feet and begin running before Lewis abruptly turns back toward the crash site, bends down and picks up a handgun lying on the ground. 

While Baksh chases Palmer on foot, Samson arrives moments later, driving toward Lewis, who was running directly at him with the gun in his right hand.

Samson testified that when Lewis came within roughly 10 feet, he saw the gun pointed in his direction. Believing he faced an imminent threat, he pressed the accelerator, striking Lewis head-on and crushing him between the front fenders of two police cars.

In the videos, the gun can be seen flying over Samson’s car, landing on the road. 

Samson backed up his vehicle to free Lewis, then jumped on his back, handcuffed him, and brought him to the curb while a civilian called 911. Lewis, now 20, was rushed to hospital with serious injuries, including multiple spinal and rib fractures and bruised lungs.

He survived, “by luck, happenstance, and timely medical attention,” Mulligan said in a downtown courtroom Monday.

Baksh was charged by the Special Investigations Unit with assault with a weapon and dangerous driving. He was convicted of assault and is awaiting sentencing.

Lewis was charged with numerous firearm-related offences. Palmer’s charges were withdrawn at the Crown’s request.

A ‘substantial and grave’ breach of constitutional rights

David Campos, the defence lawyer representing Lewis, brought a Charter application seeking a stay of proceedings or exclusion of the firearm. He argued that police violated Lewis’s Section 7 right to security of the person by subjecting him to arbitrary and dangerous force, and his Section 9 right not to be arbitrarily detained. Lewis was unlawfully detained the moment the officer hit the scooter without any lawful grounds or articulable cause, Campos argued.

The Crown conceded that the rights of Lewis and Palmer were seriously breached when the officer rammed the scooter in the first collision. But the prosecution argued Samson acted reasonably in the second collision “given the immediate danger he posed because he was armed with a firearm.”

Mulligan found the first collision happened “apparently without any justification” — noting Baksh’s guilty plea. She called it a serious departure from acceptable police conduct, especially given the absence of urgency to arrest Palmer. Nor was Lewis being sought by police. She noted that had there been a designated lead officer, “I very much doubt the takedown of Mr. Palmer would have occurred the way it did.”

The second collision was more complex. Mulligan accepted that Samson saw the gun in Lewis’s hand a few seconds before striking him and believed he posed a lethal threat. Campos argued he did not see it. But the judge also found that Samson had already decided to block Lewis’s path before seeing the weapon, despite having no lawful grounds to detain him. The use of both police vehicles was “a form of compulsory restraint on his liberty, not to mention a threat to his life and physical safety.”

Both collisions, she concluded, involved the use of police vehicles — in the words of the defence — as a “kinetic weapon,” each with the potential to seriously maim or kill. She agreed Lewis’s constitutional rights were violated and that the breaches were “substantial and grave” and committed contrary to the officers’ training and stated goals.

While she declined to grant the stay — despite what she called the “shocking” circumstances — she agreed to exclude the gun, effectively ending Lewis’s trial with an acquittal. The firearm, she noted, was a restricted weapon with an over‑capacity magazine loaded with ammunition, “an absolute scourge” in communities. Yet, she said, its exclusion “better serves the long‑term repute of the administration of justice than its admission.”

Lewis initially spent 11 months in custody, got bail in June 2025, and was re-arrested in February for breaching his house arrest conditions.

He was convicted only of breaching a release order by being out of his residence without his surety. He received a suspended sentence and six months’ probation. 

The judge left one question open — did the “obviously poor” decision-making that day belong to the individual officers, the teams, or the Toronto Police Service itself?

“I cannot tell,” based on the limited evidence before me, she said.

However, “I’m certain that crashing into a moving scooter, with a driver who was arrestable for failing to comply with a release order, carrying an unknown passenger, is not standard or acceptable police practice,” Mulligan said Monday at the conclusion of Lewis’s short-lived trial.

Campos commended the court for “doing the right thing” by excluding “evidence obtained in such a barbaric manner.” He wrote in a text message: “My client is very lucky to be alive after being intentionally mowed down by an unmarked police car for no reason.”

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By Anastasia Blosser Staff Reporter, Mahdis Habibinia City Hall Bureau, and Patty Winsa Business Reporter

What was supposed to have been a joyful summer dance party was instead a desolate stretch of police tape on Sunday, after two people were shot dead at Salsa on St. Clair the night before, prompting the cancellation of the festival’s second day.

The killings were part of a roughly 36-hour stretch of gun violence — three separate shooting incidents across the city that left three men dead and 11 others injured.

Saturday’s violence also raised questions about public safety at one of the city’s best-known summer street events. Hours after the gunfire on St. Clair West near Arlington Avenue, another chaotic shooting outside a nightclub in the Port Lands left five people injured.

On Sunday, stretches of the St. Clair festival grounds stood nearly empty with vacant vendor stalls, litter strewn across the streetcar tracks and boxes of charcoal left beside overflowing garbage bins.

Toronto’s top police officer said his force will be “relentless” in hunting those responsible for the shootings, including the attack that killed two people during Saturday night’s festival. 

“The brazen violence we witnessed in the middle of a community festival where thousands were gathered to enjoy a summer evening with family and friends is heartbreaking and unacceptable,” said Toronto Police Chief Myron Demkiw in a social media post Sunday, referring to shootings that took place during Salsa on St. Clair and in the Port Lands.

Demkiw wrote that his thoughts are with the families of those who lost their lives and with everyone impacted by “senseless” violence.

Police have not identified victims or suspects in Saturday night’s shootings. 

Gun violence

The latest killings bring Toronto’s gun homicide total this year to 13, compared with 10 in 2025 year to date.

The same data shows police had recorded 122 shootings and firearms discharges this year by July 6 — which distinguish incidents where someone was struck by gunfire from those in which shots were fired but no one was injured. That is roughly half the 250 recorded by the same point in 2024, the highest level in the past five years.

There was an eerie calm on the street on Sunday compared to the chaos of the night before.

Police cruisers and yellow crime scene tape cut through sections of the festival route as officers redirected morning joggers, dog walkers and parents pushing strollers around the cordoned-off blocks.

Police restricted access to businesses closest to the main crime scene and told owners they would have to remain closed for the day.

Local resident Ken Ough, who was sitting on his walker just outside the police tape on Sunday, worried about what the violence could mean for the festival’s future.

“This is really going to hurt the neighbourhood, the stores and businesses,” Ough said. “This festival isn’t just for the booths. It’s for the restaurants, the community, everyone. They’re all going to be really affected.”

Street festival may have outgrown its location

Local Coun. Josh Matlow said in an interview Sunday, echoing some residents’ concerns, that the city should re-evaluate whether Salsa on St. Clair has “outgrown its original mandate” at its current location, since it began more than two decades ago as a cultural celebration and food festival.

“The festival was created as a way to bring business back to St. Clair after the construction of the streetcar right-of-way,” Matlow told the Star.

“I love the celebration of Latin culture in our city, but I believe the time has come to have an honest review of whether or not the festival has outgrown its original location.”

Matlow said some residents suggested the festival be moved to a large park where attendance could be better screened and the site better secured. He argued the city should also look at restricting the festival to daytime hours as another option.

Heather Hannah, the chair of the local Hillcrest Village BIA Board, had planned to learn samba with seniors on Sunday morning.

Instead, she was fielding non-stop calls from business owners, merchants and residents — while reeling herself — from Saturday night’s gun violence.

“I was hoping to be dancing today,” Hannah said in an interview. “It only takes one second for something to go terribly wrong. And that’s what happened.”

Hannah said she agreed with Matlow for the most part.

She said “no doubt” the city and everybody involved will be examining what happened and the festival’s operations, but noted it’s “very hard” to police a street festival that’s not enclosed. They are also free, public events so it’s difficult to control access and screen everybody as well, she added.

Amid rising security costs for street festivals, Hannah questioned whether festivals should be free, “although people would argue they’re a service.”

“Let’s face it,” Hannah continued. “It’s become more and more popular over time — both for the good and the bad.”

This isn’t the first time someone has fired a gun at Salsa on St. Clair.

In 2024, Toronto police arrested and disarmed a man who shot a single bullet during a confrontation that occurred after a couple cut in line in a bathroom queue.

One dead in Friday night shooting, five injured outside nightclub early Sunday

The violence at the St. Clair festival on Saturday night followed a targeted shooting late Friday that left one man dead. 

Shortly after 11 p.m. that night, police say three suspects, dressed in black and wearing masks, arrived in a stolen black Honda Civic and targeted three men in their 20s outside a townhouse complex near Lawrence Avenue West and Jane Street. One man was killed and two others injured.

Police later identified the victim as 22-year-old Toronto resident Abdihamiim Aden.

Police said Saturday there have been no arrests.

More violence followed on Sunday. Police responded to reports of gunshots in the Polson and Cherry street area and later said there was an exchange of gunfire that left five people injured.

Police say one suspect fired a weapon and then stole a vehicle from a rideshare driver with passengers inside. The vehicle struck pedestrians, one of whom was taken to hospital, as well as other vehicles while fleeing the scene. Two people were taken to hospital with gunshot wounds.

Police, who recovered a weapon, say a 25-year-old Brampton man has been charged with discharge of a firearm recklessly, unauthorized possession of a firearm, robbery and forcible confinement, as well as a number of other offences. 

A second suspect is wanted, but police did not have a description on Sunday.

With files from Simon McKeown

Correction – July 12, 2026

This article has been updated to reflect that the latest killings bring Toronto’s gun homicide total this year to at least 13.

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By Abby O’Brien Staff Reporter

The allegations levelled by Project South investigators against Peel Const. Scott King share stark similarities to those made against several of the Toronto cops arrested in the sprawling corruption scandal: It’s alleged he ran a search on a police computer on behalf of a suspected criminal.

What makes King stand out is that he wasn’t charged.

The allegations against King are contained in records Project South investigators filed in court to obtain warrants for phones, vehicles and homes belonging to officers and others suspected of criminality.

Just as the records shed new light on the officer’s alleged conduct, they also raise questions about investigators’ decision to charge some officers but not others.

Four of the current or retired Toronto officers arrested in Project South face criminal charges related to improper searches of police databases. At least three of them are accused of sharing information from those searches with alleged criminals. For one of them, the only criminal charges he faces relate to an alleged computer search.

Those Toronto officers have been suspended without pay while their cases make their way through court. King was initially suspended, but Peel police confirmed in May that the suspension had been lifted and the officer, along with two others, had “been cleared of any criminality.”

The allegations, found in a document known as an information-to-obtain a warrant or an ITO, reflect what investigators believed about their targets at the time it was filed in court in January. None of the allegations have been proven or tested in court.

Still, the different outcomes in the high-profile case of alleged corruption are raising eyebrows.

“It clearly has a massive odour to it, doesn’t it?” said Ian Scott, former director of Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit, who has no first-hand knowledge of the case or its details.

“There could be some real nuances in the background … but on the surface, that sounds like deep police insider information to someone who has criminal connections.”

King did not respond to the Star’s request for comment through Peel police and their union. When previously reached by the Star, he hung up the phone.

In a statement to the Star in May, a spokesperson for York Regional Police — which led the Project South investigation — said that a person may become the subject of an investigation for a number of reasons, “but generally because there is evidence supporting potential criminal allegations.”

“As the investigation progresses, the evidence may either eliminate that person as a suspect or provide grounds for arrest and charges.”

Heightened focus on police computer misuse

The misuse of private police databases does not necessarily result in criminal consequences.

In recent years, officers who pleaded guilty to the offence before the Toronto police disciplinary tribunal received penalties ranging from a few days docked pay to a demotion.

However, the announcement of the Project South arrests in February — and the revelation that Toronto Const. Timothy Barnhardt allegedly sold information from computer searches to criminals who used it to facilitate shootings and other violent acts — has brought heightened attention. Since then, at least two officers in the Greater Toronto Area have been criminally charged with unauthorized use of a police computer.

In King’s case, the alleged database query was done in 2025, following a shooting at a house party in Brampton. 

Four months after the September shooting, King was served with a notice of investigation by Peel police’s Professional Standards Bureau (PSB), a specialized unit tasked with probing internal misconduct. Investigators believed he’d conducted an “unqualified” query of the shooting.

Letting King know he was under investigation was part of a strategy to stimulate “reactionary conversation,” according to the ITO.

Police listened in as King had several conversations about the investigation in the hours that followed. 

‘Not doing anything greasy’

Police allege he placed a call to a colleague in the Professional Standards unit, Det. Adrian Shipp.

“You spinning me, or what?” King asked Shipp, according to the ITO document. Just before noon, King picked up Shipp and the two were allegedly captured on covert audio probes while speaking in King’s Toyota Venza.

According to the investigators, King told Shipp he had conducted the computer query on behalf of his “acquaintance” Ryan Cribbie, who would later be arrested in Project South and charged with conspiracy to commit extortion and firearm offences.

Cribbie had reached out on behalf of Tim Barnhardt, the Toronto cop, King is described as telling Shipp.

“Let me know what you find out, brother, and I’ll send it to Timbo,” King recounted Cribbie telling him.

According to the documents, King said he told Cribbie he would have to give the information directly to Barnhardt. When the query failed to turn up any meaningful results, he relayed that information to Cribbie.

In another conversation monitored by police, the ITO describes King saying he doesn’t remember doing the search, and that he suspects the interest in the database query is tied to “a massive project” into “corrupt cops.”

“I’m not concerned at all, like, I’m not doing anything greasy,” King is quoted as saying.

According to investigators, Shipp conducted his own query to confirm whether King was indeed under investigation by Peel’s PSB.

Shipp was later asked to remove himself from Peel’s investigation into King over a potential conflict of interest and briefly suspended. Peel Regional Police said he, too, is back at work and has been cleared of any criminal wrongdoing. The Star did not receive a response to questions for Shipp sent to the Peel Police Association.

Detective ‘knowingly’ acquired illegally ‘diverted’ drugs: Project South ITO

The documents also contain new details regarding Det. Const. Robert Chudzinski, a member of Toronto’s Guns & Gangs Task Force who was investigated for the suspected possession of controlled substances.

In the ITO, investigators allege that intercepted conversations and surveillance records establish that Chudzinski “knowingly acquired and possessed unlawfully diverted prescription drugs.”

Large portions of the ITO remain under a court-ordered publication ban, and the parts that are reportable do not specify what prescription drug or how much of it Chudzinski allegedly possessed.

Chudzinski is described in the documents as an associate of Robert Black, a Toronto sergeant charged in Project South with conspiracy to obstruct justice, counselling fraud under $5,000 and possession of Adderall and cocaine for the purpose of trafficking.

Toronto Police Association president Clayton Campbell confirmed Chudzinski had not been charged criminally or under the Community Safety and Policing Act. A Toronto Police Service spokesperson said Chudzinski remains assigned to detective operations.

Ontario watchdog leading misconduct investigation

In February, Ontario’s Law Enforcement Complaints Agency announced it would take over the investigations into three Peel officers suspended in relation to Project South. The agency said it has put its probe on ice as “the ongoing related criminal” proceedings make their way through the courts.

If the allegations are eventually substantiated by the provincial watchdog, the officers could face non-criminal charges under Ontario’s new Community Safety and Policing Act.

“There’s a huge divide” between criminal proceedings and internal discipline, the latter of which has “no requirement for public disclosure,” says former SIU director Scott.

“Under the new act, there could be a number of administrative penalties doled out, which would not fall into the public forum,” Scott said. “They can be as light as a reprimand ... in which case, no, you wouldn’t hear much about it.”

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