Man says wife fabricated criminal allegations, Ont. CA acknowledges factual inaccuracies in trial decision
In an assault case, the Ontario Court of Appeal ruled that a judge properly exercised his trial management powers in rejecting a man’s application under s. 278.1 of the Criminal Code, 1985, in the middle of his wife’s testimony.
The trial evidence in R. v. Ranu, 2025 ONCA 663, indicated that the appellant and the complainant met in India and married in 2017. The complainant wife went to study in Canada shortly afterward.
The appellant husband got his visa nearly a year later. Upon arriving in Canada in April 2018, he fought with the complainant on the way to the house and had sex with her without her consent that night.
The couple argued again on their first wedding anniversary two days later. The appellant pulled the complainant’s hair and covered her mouth with his hand to keep her from leaving the house.
Within a month of the appellant coming to Canada, the complainant left him while he was visiting relatives. She did not file police reports regarding the two incidents due to her shame and the stigma that might impact her family in India.
In September 2018, the complainant’s brother called her to relay that authorities had arrested their parents and sister in India based on marriage fraud charges. When the complainant brought up the two incidents with the appellant, her brother urged her to report what happened to the police.
The appellant alleged that the complainant took financial advantage of him when she moved to Canada and fabricated criminal allegations to get back at him for the marriage fraud charges in India.
In October 2021, Justice Irving André of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, sitting with a jury, entered convictions against the appellant on one count each of sexual assault and assault against his ex-wife.
In response to a s. 278.1 application filed by the defence, the Crown argued that the complainant had talked to police about emails and messages, so defence counsel was aware of this information in the proceedings’ early stages.
The trial judge agreed with the Crown’s argument and prevented defence counsel from pursuing the matter further. The judge determined that the defence should have filed the s. 278.1 application before the trial, not midway through the complainant’s cross-examination.
The appellant brought conviction appeals. He asserted that the judge made an unfair ruling based on a misapprehension of the facts and stopped the defence from trying to prove the complainant’s fabrication of even more messages. He added that the s. 278.1 regime did not cover the messages.
The Court of Appeal for Ontario dismissed the appeal.
The appeal court accepted that the trial judge made factual inaccuracies in some aspects of his decision. The appeal court noted that the judge found that the appellant could provide a complete answer and defence because he possessed the electronic correspondence mentioned by the complainant.
The appeal court pointed out that the appellant claimed he had not seen the fabricated correspondence.
However, the appeal court held that the judge had ample justification for the substance of his ruling and made no error in refusing to entertain the application in the middle of the complainant’s testimony.
The appeal court noted that the Supreme Court of Canada warned against this kind of mid-trial application in R. v. J.J., 2022 SCC 28.
The appeal court concluded that the defence should have pursued this matter before trial and was speculatively alleging that the messages would have supported the appellant’s position.
