Supreme Court upholds 2 manslaughter convictions for 2013 homicide

The Supreme Court of Canada has upheld manslaughter convictions for two men related to a 2013 homicide in downtown Toronto.

In a 3-2 decision released Friday morning, the court dismissed an appeal by Emanuel Lozada and Victor Ramos.

Both men were convicted of manslaughter in a jury trial for the stabbing death of Rameez Khalid in October 2013. A third man was convicted of second-degree murder.

The appeal hinged on the argument that the trial judge made a legal error in their instructions to the jury.

Specifically, Lozada and Ramos argued the judge did not give accurate instructions on causation, necessary to determine whether the two men were legal causes of Khalid's death, despite not stabbing him themselves.

"On a reading of the jury instructions and the trial judge's answer to the jury's questions as a whole, the jury was accurately instructed," wrote Justice Mary Moreau for the majority opinion.

However, writing the dissenting opinion, Justice Mahmud Jamal wrote "the trial judge's instructions on the causation element … did not properly equip the jury to decide the case according to the law."

The two men had previously appealed their convictions together at the Ontario Court of Appeal on the same argument, where it was also dismissed by the majority.

Khalid was stabbed after a fight between two groups who had attended a "pop-up rave" downtown during Nuit Blanche.