Case information

None.

Case summaries are prepared by the Office of the Registrar of the Supreme Court of Canada (Law Branch). Please note that summaries are not provided to the Judges of the Court. They are placed on the Court file and website for information purposes only.

On January 13, 2003, the Respondent pleaded guilty to a charge of stealing a sum of money over $5,000, thereby committing an offence under s. 334(a) of the Criminal Code. The victim ran a grocery store and was the Respondent’s employer. The Respondent had embezzled $425,000 from deposits he was supposed to have made. A search of the Respondent’s home led to the recovery of $150,000.

On April 21, 2004, after having considered the presentence report and sentences handed down in similar cases, the Court of Quebec sentenced the Respondent to two years less a day, to be served in the community, with two years’ probation and a restitution order for $268,430 under s. 738 of the Criminal Code.

The Appellant introduced a motion for leave to appeal to the Court of Appeal. The Appellant also brought a motion to introduce new evidence showing that on August 20, 2003, the Respondent had been arrested when he attempted to cash a forged certified cheque from the National Bank of Canada made payable to him in the amount of $12,000. The Appellant also wanted to demonstrate that on February 20, 2004, during a search of the Respondent’s home, police found a cheque certification stamp from the branch of the National Bank where the Respondent was a cleaner, an unactivated automatic teller card and two cheques from the same bank made out for $425,000 by means of a cheque-writing machine. In its motion, the Appellant stressed that these actions had led to charges and that it was submitting this evidence not to obtain a harsher sentence, but to demonstrate the Respondent’s character so that the Court could determine if allowing the Respondent to serve his sentence in the community would put the community at risk.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the motion to introduce new evidence on the ground that the evidence was not relevant. The Court also dismissed the motion for leave to appeal and the motion to stay execution of the sentence.