In R. v. Case (Ont CA, 2024) the Ontario Court of Appeal dismissed a criminal appeal, here considering when an expert witness is required or a judge can make the fact-finding:
[12] To the extent that the appellants’ argument suggests that expert evidence was required to support the trial judge’s reliability findings, R. v. François, 1994 CanLII 52 (SCC), [1994] 2 S.C.R. 827 is squarely against it. As the Crown submits, trial judges deal with issues of intoxication and memory routinely, in sexual assault complaints and in numerous other contexts, and do so without the need for expert evidence. See e.g., R. v. B.W.W., 2017 ONSC 985; R. v. R.D., 2017 ONSC 1856, aff’d 2019 ONCA 132.
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