Case information

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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.

Criminal law - Evidence - Disclosure - Whether Quebec Court of Appeal erred in law in holding that wiretapping of Applicant by state during his trial, combined with deliberately late disclosure of conclusive evidence, had not affected fairness of trial or caused prejudice to integrity of judicial system and that adjournment was accordingly appropriate remedy - Whether Quebec Court of Appeal exceeded its powers by applying curative proviso to error in charge concerning standard of proof applicable to Applicant’s admissions on basis that, in its view, jury could not have believed Applicant’s version anyway.

Bernier was charged with first degree murder, sexual assault, kidnapping, forcible confinement and personation. Julie Boisvenu had disappeared on June 23, 2002, shortly after leaving a bar in the city of Sherbrooke. A few days later, on June 29, 2002, her body was found in a ditch in the Bromptonville area. In the course of the police investigation, the accused was questioned on July 4, 2002 about his movements on the evening of the incident in question. After samples taken in the victim’s car were found to match his DNA profile, the accused was arrested in Montreal. At trial, the accused applied for a stay of proceedings under s. 24(1) of the Charter, alleging that an important piece of evidence had been disclosed late and impugning the state’s conduct in obtaining that evidence. The court found that it had not been proved that either the admission into evidence of the statement made by the accused to an inmate or the circumstances in which that statement had been obtained would affect the fairness of the trial. In the circumstances, the court held that the appropriate remedy was to grant an adjournment given that all the undisclosed documents had been disclosed to the defence the day after being disclosed at the hearing. The court also authorized the defence to recall any witness if there was a reasonable possibility that the cross-examination of the witness would have been conducted differently.