Supreme Court to hear appeal of jail sentence for man who stole Churchill portrait from Ottawa hotel

The man who stole the “Roaring Lion” portrait of Winston Churchill from Ottawa’s Chateau Laurier hotel four years ago will be allowed to appeal his jail sentence to Canada’s highest court.

The Supreme Court of Canada granted leave to appeal the sentence on Thursday.

In May 2025, Jeffrey Wood was sentenced to two years less a day in jail after pleading guilty to theft over $5,000, trafficking in stolen property and knowingly committing forgery by making a false document.

Wood appealed the sentence to the Ontario Court of Appeal, but the court dismissed the appeal in a two-to-one ruling last October.

“As the sentencing judge found, the theft and forgery ‘was an affront to the Château Laurier and to the reputation of (Yousuf) Karsh, and to everyone who was deceived by the forgery,’” Justice Patrick Monahan wrote in his decision.

“It was a ‘significant crime’ deserving of a denunciatory sentence.”

The portrait of former British prime minister Winston Churchill, known as the “Roaring Lion,” was stolen from the Fairmont Château Laurier between Dec. 25, 2021, and Jan. 6, 2022. The portrait by photographer Yousuf Karsh wasn’t discovered missing until August 2022.

In September 2024, the Ottawa Police Service announced the portrait had been located in Italy. Police said the portrait was sold through an auction house in London to a buyer in Italy.

• Sir Winston Churchill ‘Roaring Lion’ portrait returns to Ottawa’s Château Laurier hotel

The photo of Churchill was taken on Dec. 30, 1941, on Parliament Hill after the then-British prime minister delivered a speech about the Second World War to Canada’s Parliament.

Karsh was a former resident of the Château Laurier for nearly two decades and operated his photography studio on the hotel’s sixth floor. In 1998, Karsh donated the portrait of Churchill to the Château Laurier on permanent loan.

No date has been set for the Supreme Court of Canada to hear Wood’s appeal.

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