Still bothered by Baltovich decision
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by Bill Rea

Some years ago, I covered a murder trial that troubled me. Truth is, it still does.

The man was convicted and sent to prison. The Crown had a fair amount of circumstantial evidence, including plausible details about a potential motive. What troubled me was the scenario that was put forth for the incident had a number of holes and inconsistencies. They were enough to make me believe a murder conviction was not warranted. The jury, however, disagreed.

Some months later, I bumped into the crown attorney who prosecuted the case. We chatted for a couple of minutes, with that particular trial coming up in the conversation. He asked for my thought, and I told him candidly that I had problems with the way things were resolved. I went on to say that it had sparked something of a crisis of faith for me in our judicial system, as I cited the names of several high-profile people who had lately received murder convictions who I thought might be innocent. One of them was Robert Baltovich.

The prosecutor looked both taken aback and amused at what I was saying.

"You probably think Guy Paul Morin is innocent too," he remarked (this was some time before the cloud was lifted from Morin's head.)

"Yes," I replied, meeting his gaze, "as a matter of fact I do."

"Remind me never to put you on one of my juries," the attorney chuckled.

I reflected on that conversation with some satisfaction last week, when I learned that Baltovich had been acquitted of killing Elizabeth Bain.

I wasn't kidding when I said I had problems with his conviction. I recall reading accounts of the trial at the time, and getting the feeling the case against Baltovich was weak. And it gratified me to a certain extent as the years went by, that every time I read or heard about Baltovich in the news, the story seemed to be based on growing doubt over his guilt in the matter. A time progressed, I came to believe we would see a day, with Baltovich walking away free and clear.

And we again are left to wonder if there is something fundamentally wrong with our judicial system. Add Baltovich to a growing list of convicted murderers in this country who have eventually been found to have been not guilty. I think of Morin, Stephen Truscott, David Milgaard, Donald Marshall.

It's easy to cite these examples, because everyone has heard of them. The frightening part of all this is the realization that these were the wrongfully convicted people we did hear about. What about the ones who were never cleared? How many people, in Canada alone, have done long stretches behind bars, or were even executed many years ago for crimes they didn't do?

This story is tragic on a couple of levels. A young woman apparently died violently, although since her body has never been found, a big question mark hangs over that statement. The Bain family has lost a loved one, and the rest of us can only ponder what that must be like. The ordeal that Baltovich and his family have been put through is terrible, and as things developed, undeserved.

And we are left with the conclusion that assuming Elizabeth Bain was murdered, her killer could well be walking the streets today. True, there's a theory that Paul Bernardo could have been mixed up in all this, but it's only a theory at this time. And I would think the last thing the Bain family needs is for the system to get the wrong guy a second time.

That's an issue that has to be addressed just about every time we find someone has been wrongfully convicted of murder. We have to accept that the real killer got away with it, as was evidently the case with whoever it was who killed Lynne Harper in 1959, then watched Truscott take the rap.

The fact that the wrong person can be convicted is one of my main arguments against capital punishment, and to my mind, it's an unanswerable one. How is the system supposed to apologize to the grave of a person who has been wrongfully put to death? A human life should not be the subject of a judicial translation of "Oops!"

Now I know this reads a bit like I'm knocking our judicial system, and I guess to an extent, I am. But as I've stated in this forum many times in the past, I realize there are few better systems practised in the world for dealing with criminals. But it is a fact that there is plenty of room for improvement, and we received another clear lesson in that reality last week; a lesson to go with all the others we've received over the years. Too many innocent people are being sent away for too many years, and in some cases, they are being put away for life.

Even if we don't have capital punishment any more (it's refreshing that the calls for its restoration don't seem as common as they were a couple of years ago), the fact that innocent people can go to prison in our society is something that should concern us all.

There were people at the time who criticized and even ridiculed me for voicing my concerns over the matter.

The truth is if it could happen to a Baltovich or a Truscott, it could happen to any of us. All we have to be is innocent.