Susan Clairmont: Appeal court orders decision released in longest domestic violence trial in Hamilton
A judge's verdict, sealed and kept secret for more than two years, will now be released following an appeal court ruling on Hamilton's longest domestic violence trial.
The Court of Appeal for Ontario released its decision April 2 on the case against three members of the Safdar family accused of confining and torturing the wife of Adeel Safdar. The court was tasked with deciding if the case had failed to honour the defendants' right to a speedy trial by exceeding the 30-month Jordan Decision limitations on the length of time from arrest to the end of trial.
Adeel Safdar, his mother Shaheen Safdar and brother Aatif Safdar were arrested April 16, 2015. On Dec. 3, 2018, Justice Andrew Goodman was scheduled to deliver his verdict. Instead, in a dramatic courtroom bombshell, the Superior Court judge ruled he would grant a stay of proceedings in response to an application by the defence because he calculated the judicial process took two months longer than Jordan allowed.
The stay meant that after more than 70 courtroom appearances, the three Safdars walked out of the John Sopinka Courthouse that day and have been living in the community without criminal court restrictions ever since.
Goodman told the court that he had also written a 170 page verdict, but that he would seal it and lock it away so that if the Court of Appeal decided to overturn the stay, the verdict could be rendered without a new trial being ordered.
That is what has now happened.
The case has been sent by Ontario's highest court back to Hamilton to schedule a date for the verdict to be delivered.
This marks the latest twist in an extraordinary case spanning the criminal and family court systems.
Adeel, a scientist, wed Dr. Sara Salim, a physician, through an arranged marriage. He brought her from her home in the United States to live with his family in Binbrook.
He is charged with assault, assault with a weapon, assault bodily harm, threatening death and aggravated assault on Sara.
Shaheen faces the same charges. Aatif was charged with assault bodily harm, assault with a weapon, assault and threatening death.
The Safdars were accused of branding Sara with an iron, breaking her jaw and forcing her to carve death threats against Adeel and their daughter into her own leg with a knife.
The Safdars refuted the allegations, saying Sara was mentally ill and caused all the injuries to herself. They said she invented stories of abuse to win back her daughter in a custody dispute.
Sara has since won full custody and is now raising her daughter in New York state. The family court judge who presided over the case was so concerned about the daughter's safety that she secretly sent police to seize the child from the Safdar home while Adeel was in court listening to her verdict.
The court of appeal decision on the criminal stay of proceedings came down to a complicated and technical mathematical exercise. Every day of delay" was parsed out by the Crown and defence to determine who caused it, why, and how it should be calculated.
Delays included: the defence retaining lawyers; more disclosure required; lack of courtroom availability; scheduling conflicts for lawyers and the judge due to other trials; an underestimation of the trial's length; the illness of the Crown attorney; an important medical appointment for a defence lawyer. While Goodman deemed some delays the fault of the Crown or the defence, others were not counted because they resulted from exceptional circumstances."
In its decision, the court of appeal wrote that the issue hinged on the definition of the end of trial" as is stated in the Jordan Decision and whether that should include the time between the final day of evidence and the day Goodman ordered the stay.
The unanimous decision from Justices Kathryn Feldman, Eileen Gillese and Bradley Miller is that period of time should not be counted, thus reducing the entire trial to 29.25 months, just below the Jordan limit.
While the decision has been made about when the trial legally ends, getting this epic case over the actual finish line will still be a feat. COVID has pushed most cases into the virtual realm and has caused a serious backlog in Hamilton. Since none of the Safdars are currently in custody, the court may not place priority on getting the accused back before Goodman - either in real life or by Zoom - to mete out the verdict.
Susan Clairmont is a Hamilton-based crime, court and social justice columnist at The Spectator. Reach her via email: sclairmont@thespec.com