Case information

Criminal law — Sentencing — Manslaughter — Drug addiction problem — Mitigating factor — Whether trial judge committed error in principle in not treating accused’s addiction problem as mitigating factor and in not giving enough weight to mitigating factors.

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.

After having spent one week consuming drugs, the applicant, Mr. Normand, who was experiencing hallucinations, stabbed his mother to death. Mr. Normand’s remarks in the hours following his arrest supported the inference that he was intoxicated at the time of the events. A psychiatrist who testified as an expert for the defence stated that it was not found that Mr. Normand suffered from any psychiatric problems. He was convicted of manslaughter, in the absence of the specific intent to be found guilty of second degree murder. In the submissions as to the sentence, the prosecutor argued that Mr. Normand should serve a 15 year sentence. The defence argued that a sentence of seven years’ imprisonment should be imposed.

The Superior Court analyzed the mitigating and aggravating factors, considered the average of the sentences imposed by that court in similar cases and imposed a sentence on Mr. Normand of 13 years less preventive detention. A majority of the Court of Appeal was of the opinion that the trial judge had not committed an error that could lead to the varying of the sentence. Since the weighing of various factors is the responsibility of the trial judge; there was no reason to intervene. The dissenting judge was of the opinion that the judge had committed an error in principle in failing to consider, as a mitigating circumstance, the drug addiction problem that Mr. Normand suffered from. Since that error had an impact on the sentence, he would have reduced the sentence to nine years.