Appeal from aggravated assault conviction. ID issue. Complainant was hit with a glass at a house party. He had recognized one of the party guests as a player on the SAIT basketball team. The next day, the complainant searched the internet and found a photo of the player with a man he recognized as his attacker. The complainant gave this photo to police. Issue on appeal of whether trial judge erred in treatment of the identification evidence.
Held: Appeal dismissed.
When the complainant was looking at photos, “he was looking for the face of a person he had seen and recognized throughout the evening in the company of [the player], a man he knew and had spoken to on previous occasions.” The trial judge characterized this as a case of recognition identification. No error in trial judge’s conclusion that, while the identification evidence was not the same as a witness who has known a suspect for a long period, the “eyewitness account nevertheless did not suffer from all the frailties of the identification of a fleeting glance of a stranger.”
A. Serink – Defence Counsel