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on wrongful convictions in Canada, October, 2004
 January 25, 2005: The
Federal government released the first
national examination of the reasons for so many wrongful convictions
in Canada.
This should be required reading for every prosecutor, cop and
criminal defence lawyer in the country. News reports
David Milgaard
The inquiry
into David Milgaard's wrongful imprisonment should be expanded
to include a complete review of Saskatchewan Justice -- injusticebusters
 Milgaard renews call for inquiry after
Fisher appeal denied
Betty Ann Adam,The
StarPhoenix, September 30, 2003
As Joyce Milgaard continues
her crusade to expose the inner workings of the Saskatchewan
justice system that sent her innocent son to prison for 23 years,
her son David Milgaard is using his $10-million compensation
to travel the world, recently obtaining a para-gliding licence
in Romania.
Joyce Milgaard hopes the Saskatchewan
government will soon call a long-promised inquiry into the wrongful
conviction, in light of Monday's Saskatchewan Court of Appeal
dismissal of Larry Fisher's bid to have his 1999 conviction for
the same crime overturned.
David Milgaard served almost
23 years in prison for the 1969 rape and murder of Saskatoon
nursing assistant Gail Miller before being released in 1992 after
the Supreme Court recommended he be given a new trial.
Saskatchewan's attorney general
entered a stay of proceedings later that year.
In 1997, a DNA sample cleared
Milgaard, and the Saskatchewan and federal governments later
agreed to pay him $10 million in compensation.
Since his release, David Milgaard
has married and settled in Vancouver. He has travelled to 25
countries, including a recent trip with his wife to Australia
and New Zealand, Joyce Milgaard said Monday.
"It' good to see him enjoying
life," she said.
"People said he would
never be normal but you know, he's doing really, really well,
I think. I'm very proud of him," she said.
David Milgaard is happy to
stay out of the public eye and enjoys the anonymity of foreign
countries. He doesn't like to be seen in public with his mother,
because people recognize her and then realize who he must be,
she said.
The DNA findings that cleared
Milgaard pointed to Fisher, a convicted serial rapist who had
raped other women in the same neighbourhood within months of
the Miller rape and murder.
Fisher was convicted on Nov.
22, 1999, and sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole
for 10 years.
He appealed earlier this year
on the grounds that much of the evidence used by the Crown should
not have been admitted at trial and that the jury should not
have been told to ignore the Milgaard conviction.
Dismissing the appeal Monday,
the Appeal Court noted that, while the defence exposed the weakness
of the DNA expert's knowledge of the database used to calculate
the statistical improbability of a random match between the samples,
the defence failed to produce its own expert evidence to contradict
her testimony.
The court found the trial judge
was correct in telling the jury the Milgaard conviction was irrelevant,
and upheld the trial judge's decision to allow similar fact evidence
to be heard at Fisher's trial.
"It is the modus operandi
of the perpetrator of the various rapes that links them to the
assault upon Ms. Miller," the decision reads.
"The attacks were all
brazen, taking place in the dark, but always at hours when other
people were out and about, and in residential areas full of houses
with people in them. . . . With the aid of a knife or the threat
of a knife, the perpetrator forced the victim, whom he found
walking on the street, into an alley, and forced her to fully
or partially undress and raped her," the decision states.
It further noted that two of
the rapes occurred within a few months of the Miller murder,
and in an area about 12 city blocks away from where the Miller
murder occurred and where Fisher lived at the time.
Fisher will likely seek leave
to appeal to the Supreme Court, his Calgary lawyer, Brian Beresh,
said Monday.
"I think the decision
with regard to similar fact and the DNA require some clarity
by the High Court," Beresh said.
"We think it's a matter
of national importance and given the profile of this case, the
law has to be clarified," he said.
Crown prosecutor Anthony Gerein
said Monday he doesn't think any of Fisher's appeal issues have
merit.
"In each case, the Court
of Appeal applied what the Supreme Court has already said in
these areas. So the Supreme Court has spoken on these things,"
Gerein said.
"From the beginning the
Crown took the position that Mr. Fisher received a fair trial.
This decision of the Court of Appeal confirms that," he
said.
Fisher has 60 days to file
an appeal to the Supreme Court, unless he requests and is given
an extension. The Crown then has 30 days to respond. Those written
submissions are then considered as the Supreme Court decides
whether or not to hear the appeal.
Justice Minister Eric Cline
was unavailable for comment Monday, but former justice minister
Chris Axworthy said at the time of Fisher's conviction that the
government would wait until he had exhausted the appeal process
before holding an inquiry.
Joyce Milgaard is already pushing
the province to fulfil its promise.
"We were very grateful
that this (appeal dismissal) has happened because the inquiry
hopefully can go forth immediately," she said.
She thinks it is "unfortunate"
that Fisher will try to get a hearing before the Supreme Court
because it continues to postpone the inquiry.
"It's been years since
they promised an inquiry and how much longer is it going to wait?
And why? Are they waiting until everyone that was implicated
in it has passed on? They just don't want to deal with it,"
Milgaard said. "I think it's really important to have the
public inquiry, the sooner the better. We'd like to get on with
our lives. I'm sure the Miller family would like to get on with
theirs and get this whole inquiry business over and done with.
"It's so important that
the people that deliberately withheld pertinent information in
1970, that they be held accountable. Unless people are held accountable,
then people, lawyers, crown attorneys, witnesses, policemen,
they're all going to still do the wrong thing because they think,
'Oh well, nothing happens if I lie.' So it's important that that
accountability take place and then maybe the system could function
properly. It certainly isn't functioning now."
Milgaard is concerned that
the inquiry, when it is called, have "the broadest possible
mandate" so as not to exclude any of the relevant information.
"I want the Saskatchewan
government to know that the David Milgaard support group is still
running . . . It will be a voice to be heard from if this inquiry
is not a broad inquiry. We aren't going to just go away. I'm
going to be out there, making sure that it is a proper inquiry,"
she said.
© Copyright 2003 The StarPhoenix (Saskatoon)
Gov't dragging feet on wrongful conviction probe:
Milgaard
- Justice department to wait
until Larry Fisher case closed
Darren Bernhardt Saskatoon
StarPhoenix, February 19. 2002
Joyce Milgaard says she is
weary of waiting for Saskatchewan's government to make good on
its promise of an inquiry into the wrongful conviction that left
her son imprisoned for 23 years, and is again pressing for action.
It was her tireless efforts
that led to a Supreme Court of Canada review of David Milgaard's
1970 conviction for the 1969 murder and rape of Saskatoon nursing
assistant Gail Miller. In 1992, David was released from prison,
and in 1997 he was exonerated based on DNA tests that showed
semen found on Miller's clothes didn't match his.
The Saskatchewan government
apologized in 1999 and, along with the federal government, paid
David $10 million in compensation -- the biggest criminal compensation
package in Canadian history.
The inquiry into how a 17-year-old
could have been falsely imprisoned for more than two decades
was announced by the government two years ago.
"The time it's taking
is absolutely ridiculous," Milgaard said Monday from Halifax,
where she attended a Nova Scotia Supreme Court hearing that exonerated
a man wrongfully convicted for the murder of his wife.
There are 41 other cases in
Canada being looked into by Milgaard, who lives in Petersfield,
Man., a small community 30 minutes north of Winnipeg, near the
southern edge of Lake Winnipeg. She is particularly interested
in closing the book on her son's case.
"I just feel that it's
really important that they (Saskatchewan Department of Justice)
stop dragging their feet and get the inquiry put forward. Why
is it taking so long? All the people that were responsible for
this will be dead before it gets into court," she said.
Larry Fisher, a previously
convicted rapist, is now serving time for Miller's murder. The
same DNA tests that exonerated Milgaard implicated Fisher in
November 1999. He was given 25 years with no parole.
In 1970, David Milgaard was
a drifter travelling through Saskatoon. By coincidence, he was
staying at the same apartment building as Fisher the morning
Miller's body was found.
 Fisher's lawyer, Brian Beresh, is seeking
an appeal, citing contaminated DNA evidence and the prejudicial
nature of evidence from three of Fisher's rape victims. The provincial
government decided not have the inquiry until the appeal process
had been exhausted.
"But what about David?"
asked Milgaard. "They want to be fair to Larry Fisher, but
I think there should be some fairness to the Milgaard family
and other people wrongfully convicted that could benefit."
A Justice Department spokesperson
said Monday the inquiry will continue to be shelved until Fisher
has had his day. The process has been delayed as Beresh has waited
for transcripts from Fisher's court appearances.
Milgaard scoffed at the excuse
for the delays, saying "maybe I'll just have to pull my
pup tent out again."
She made a threat to pitch
her tent on the lawn of the Saskatchewan legislature in 1999
to force quick action on compensation for her son. The government,
which had been against giving more than $5 million, soon agreed
to a package worth twice that amount.
"It worked that time,"
said Milgaard. "Maybe it can again."
She said David is "doing
really well, travelling and enjoying life" since overcoming
the trouble he had adapting to his freedom. He couldn't hold
a job and had an encounter with police in Vancouver, where he
now lives with his wife.
© Copyright 2002 Saskatoon
StarPhoenix
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