On November 24, 2022, the Supreme Court of Canada released four judgments in which it considered the defence or excuse of entrapment (R. v. Ramelson, 2022 SCC 44, R. v. Jaffer, 2022 SCC 45, R. v. Haniffa, 2022 SCC 46, and R. v. Dare, 2022 SCC 47). The entrapment issue was considered in these appeals in the context of online police investigations in which the police provided individuals with an opportunity to commit sexual offences against children. All four of the appeals involved the accused communicating with undercover police officers through an online escort service. In each case, the undercover officers indicated that they were children. In each case, the accused, despite this information, agreed to meet the children at a hotel room. All four went to the designated room where they were arrested and charged with various offences. At their trials, all four argued that a judicial stay of proceedings should be entered based upon them having been entrapped. These arguments were rejected by the trial judges in all of the cases except one (Ramelson). In the latter case, the Ontario Court of Appeal set aside the stay (see 2021 ONCA 328). All four individuals were granted leave to appeal from conviction by the Supreme Court of Canada. The appeals gave the Court the opportunity to consider how entrapment applies to online investigations.

In this column, I will consider these decisions in an attempt to determine if the Supreme Court of Canada has formulated a new standard for assessing entrapment in online investigations. I will compare the Canadian approach to the American approach. I will also consider the approach taken in other common-law countries. I commence with a review of the Supreme Court of Canada’s entrapment jurisprudence to put their recent decisions in context. This requires that I start with R. v. Mack, [1988] 2 S.C.R. 903, the Supreme Court of Canada’s seminal judgment on the law of entrapment.