Ms. Granada was originally charged with shoplifting from a Calgary Co-op grocery store. She pleaded guilty and was given a conditional discharge. She was also informed that she was banned from all Co-op stores for life.
Within a month she was seen on camera returning to the same store. She spent approximately four minutes in the store without making a purchase. Two days later sewing pins were found in three pieces of cheese.
Five days later she returned to the store without making a purchase. Within one hour, a cheese bun was found with a two-inch sewing needle inside. Several other items were discovered to have pins and needles pushed into them.
After a third and fourth visit, employees found a nail in a bag of carrots, a sewing needle in a bag of radishes, a nail in some sauerkraut, and a sewing pin in a banana.
At trial the Crown called an expert in Kinesiology and bio-mechanics of human anatomy to interpret her movements on video, namely her arm movement when she picked up and returned a cheese item.
After applying the Mohan criteria, this evidence was admitted at trial. The accused appealed in part on the basis that the evidence was unnecessary and unhelpful.
In dismissing the appeal, the Court held the following:
Even if we were to accept the first argument, namely that the evidence was unnecessary and unhelpful, we fail to see any real prejudice arising from its admission. Simply put, if the expert's evidence was superfluous, in that it was testimony of the obvious, its admission may have been an unnecessary expenditure of trial time and perhaps even a distraction, but it did not extend beyond that. Certainly, it did not result in an unfair trial [para 12].
MC