Driving ban not valid sentence for criminal negligence causing death, Supreme Court says

A Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) ruling made this week in the case of a Saskatchewan man convicted of killing two people in a head-on collision says lower courts cannot impose driving prohibitions for criminal negligence causing death or bodily harm.

The top court says the ruling stems from a legal quirk in the Criminal Code caused by parliamentary amendments aimed at simplifying the code's language.

People guilty of lesser driving-related offences — such as dangerous operation of a motor vehicle causing death — can still receive driving bans, but not those guilty of criminal negligence causing death or bodily harm.

In a 5-4 split decision released Friday morning, the SCC set aside the driving prohibition imposed on Braydon Wolfe, who was sentenced to six years in prison and a 10-year driving ban for killing two people in a highway collision near Langham, Sask., in 2017.

Wolfe drove his half-ton truck into the front of a sedan carrying Mohammad Niazi, his wife Sanginand their daughter Zohal. The father and daughter died at the scene, while Sangin survived.

Wolfe was convicted of two counts of criminal negligence causing death and one count of criminal negligence causing bodily harm at Court of Queen's Bench in Saskatoon. The sentence included two 10-year and one seven-year driving bans to be served concurrently.

In 2022, the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal upheld the prison sentence and the driving ban, but Wolfe appealed the driving ban to Canada's top court, which decided to hear the case based on national importance.

On Friday, the SCC ruled in favour of Wolfe and his Saskatoon lawyer Katherine Pocha of Little and Company.

"Criminal negligence offences are not listed as offences that can attract a discretionary driving prohibition. They used to be listed, but are no longer," wrote Justice Sheilah Martin in the majority's decision.

In the dissenting opinion, Justice Mary Moreau wrote that "the majority's interpretation … produces the absurd consequence that a driving prohibition order can be imposed for a lesser offence, but not the principal offence."

The case is based on the statutory interpretation of the Criminal Code after Parliament amended the Criminal Code in 2018.

Previously, the list of offences for which a driving ban could be imposed included criminal negligence causing death or bodily harm. New wording in the 2018 amendments didn't specifically include those offences.

"So it became really murky," said Pocha in an interview Friday afternoon.

"The way that the new provision reads, it wasn't simplified, it wasn't coherent, and that's not consistent with the idea that people need to be able to understand these types of things clearly."

The ruling effectively prohibits judges from imposing driving bans for convictions of criminal negligence causing death or bodily harm until Parliament amends the Criminal Code.

Saskatoon criminal lawyer Brian Pfefferle anticipates Parliament will move quickly to make amendments reinstating the sentencing option. He suggested it was an oversight by Parliament.

"This is obviously, in my view, not part of legislative intent. The appeal exploited a clear error in the law," Pfefferle said.

"Parliament dropped the ball, simply put…. But the Supreme Court of Canada wasn't prepared to pick up the ball that Parliament dropped."

Pfefferle said the ruling has implications for cases across Canada as other people with driving prohibition sentences contemplate their own appeals.

"This [ruling] means there is opportunity now for some of those individuals to apply to have their driving suspension opened up," Pfefferle said.

"Around the country there will be defence lawyers taking calls from clients saying, 'Yeah, I've got a criminal negligence case. I got a driving suspension and I want to have it reversed.'"