They secured the premises, including several marijuana plants. A search warrant was then sought and executed. The appellants were convicted of possession of marijuana for the purpose of trafficking and their appeal was dismissed. A warrantless search is presumed to be unreasonable unless the party seeking to justify the search can rebut this presumption. The presumption was not rebutted here.
Warrants based solely on information gleaned in violation of the Charter are invalid.
Where, however, the warrant was issued partially on the strength of tainted evidence and partially on properly obtained evidence, the court must consider whether the warrant would have been issued absent the improperly obtained evidence. This tip was clearly insufficient to justify a warrant. As a result, the search conducted under the warrant was unreasonable within the meaning of s. 8 of the Charter . The admission of the impugned evidence would not render the appellants' trial unfair. The evidence was real evidence that existed irrespective of a Charter violation and the appellants were in no way conscripted against themselves in creating it.