L'horizon temporel pour exécuter un mandat de perquisition selon la Cour d'Appel de l'Ontario

R. v. Samuels, 2024 ONCA 786

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[28]      First, since Det. Veal already had grounds to obtain a search warrant for the apartment by September 1, 2020, he could have prepared and submitted the application for the warrant before the appellant was arrested. Even if it was reasonable for Det. Veal and his superiors to want to delay the apartment search until after the appellant had been arrested, “[t]here is no statutory time limit for the execution of conventional search warrants”: R. v. Jodoin, 2018 ONCA 638, at para. 18. A search warrant with no express execution date must be executed on the same day that it is issued, but a justice of the peace can also specify “a range of dates”: R. v. Saint, 2017 ONCA 491, 353 C.C.C. (3d) 467, at paras. 1, 19-21. Since Det. Veal’s grounds for believing that drugs were in the apartment were not particularly time-sensitive, he could have submitted his search warrant application on September 1, but asked the issuing justice to extend the execution period long enough to give the police time to first find and arrest the appellant. Indeed, Det. Veal agreed at trial that he knew he could have requested a 24-hour execution window.