Impaired driving charges were stayed against an accused man because Toronto police officers who were asked to testify booked their vacation at the same time as the man’s trial, the Crown recently informed a judge in a College Park courtroom.

Crown attorney Lindsay Kromm told Ontario court Justice William Horkins on March 10 that the April trial for Saman Azimi would not be able to go ahead as planned because she was informed that the officers she had asked to testify would not be making themselves available.

The case had already dragged on for more than two years, for a variety of reasons, and any further adjournment would have meant the case would have breached the time limit for matters in provincial court set by the Supreme Court of Canada in a landmark ruling last year.

Kromm said she had asked for several officers to testify to respond to a Charter of Rights and Freedoms application brought by the defence, alleging constitutional violations following Azimi’s arrest in October 2014.

She explained in court that a trial notification for next month’s trial had been sent to Toronto police on June 23, 2016, but it was only in January that the officer in charge of the case emailed Kromm to say he didn’t believe many of the officers requested to testify were necessary.

“I told him there was a charter application before the court and it was my opinion that those officers were necessary and I required them to be here for trial,” Kromm told Horkins, according to a court recording obtained by the Star.

She said she then received a further email informing her that two of the officers were “unavailable for trial because they were going on vacation to Florida.”

That email came after the defence had already argued before Horkins that the delay in the case had been unreasonable and the charges should be stayed, in what is known as an 11(b) application.

“So I responded, I told them that I didn’t want Your Honour to waste time writing an 11(b) decision if the officers were going to be unavailable and we would have to adjourn the second trial date, the consequences of which would be obvious to anyone,” she said in court.

“I spoke to my deputies and we responded to the officers that this was the problem of the Toronto Police Service, they were going to have to find a way to get these officers back, even if it was for one day to attend the trial.”

After Horkins released his 11(b) decision in February dismissing the defence’s application for a stay of proceedings, Kromm said she received another email from two Toronto police officers.

“Who, to the best of my knowledge, have not attended law school, but saw fit to inform me that in their opinion, the officers I requested were unnecessary, the Toronto Police Service was not going to make them available, and that I should learn my case, and these officers were not required,” Kromm told Horkins.

“The officers are clearly required. I came to that conclusion on the basis of legal knowledge and experience. I obviously would not have asked for their attendance were they not required to respond to the charter application.”

A spokesperson for the Toronto police, Meaghan Gray, told the Star the Crown’s comments are “concerning” and the force is looking into the matter.

Kromm did not return a request for comment from the Star for this article.

“The court acknowledged the Crown’s appropriate exercise of discretion in staying the prosecution, which ultimately allowed the court to use the vacated dates in April for other trial matters,” said Emilie Smith, speaking for the Ministry of the Attorney General.

Azimi’s lawyer, Daniel Lerner, said the case highlights the need for all players in the justice system to work on reducing court delays, particularly in light of the Supreme Court’s ruling in R v. Jordan last year, which set strict timelines to bring an accused to trial.

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“(This case) is an example of where the Crown and the courts and the defence are addressing delay issues, but were dependent on other parties like the police, and it's not clear to me, generally speaking but also based on this case, what steps the police have taken to address delays in the criminal justice system,” Lerner told the Star.

“I think what this case brings out is: How aware are the police forces of their role in dealing with delays?”