Top Ontario court rejects Sarnia man’s appeal

Ontario’s top court has rejected a Sarnia man’s appeal.

Article content Ontario’s top court has rejected a Sarnia man’s appeal. In a recently released decision, a three-judge panel from the province’s Appeal Court dismissed the man’s attempt to have part of his sentence changed. Recommended Videos The man was sentenced last year in a Sarnia courtroom by Justice Mark Poland to a year and three months in jail for assault, uttering death threats, and theft.

He was also sentenced to three years probation. “His primary concern is with restrictive probationary terms the trial judge imposed that were not part of the joint submission on sentence that the parties put forward. He also seeks to reduce the length of the probation term,” the Appeal Court decision says.

Last year, assistant Crown attorney Nicole Godfrey and the man’s lawyer Terry Brandon jointly suggested a 15-month jail sentence and a three-year probation order with rules about not contacting the complainant and not having any weapons. Poland at the time said the amount of jail was appropriate, but said he was disturbed by the recidivist man’s history — he called him a ticking time bomb — and that the complainant didn’t understand the risk he poses. He noted joint submissions are binding on a judge unless they’re contrary to public interest or could bring the administration of justice into disrepute, per a Supreme Court decision.

Then he cautioned the lawyers he planned to depart from their joint submission only on some of the probation conditions and gave them a chance to address him on that topic. Godfrey declined while Brandon argued several of the proposed probation rules, based on input from her client and previous bail hearings involving him. After hearing from Brandon, Poland opted to include additional probation terms to protect the complainant and other people the man may meet.

“His decision to depart was compliant with the authority, fair, and reasonable, as was the agreed upon length of the sentence. We reject this ground of appeal,” the Appeal Court’s decision says. The court also rejected the man’s argument Poland erred by assuming facts not agreed to by Brandon and Godfrey.

“The appeal is dismissed,” the judges said. The man was in jail as of Tuesday and is due back in court next week on new charges in Sarnia.