STORY: "Vancouver launches all-fronts attack on Ivan Henry," by reporter Ian Mulgrew," published by the Vancouver Sun On October 23, 2015.'
SUB-HEADING: "City view: He would have ended up in prison anyway."
PHOTO CAPTION: "Ivan
Henry, front left, who was wrongfully convicted of sexual assault in
1983, and his daughter Tanya Olivares leave B.C. Supreme Court in
Vancouver earlier in the trial in which he is seeking compensation."
GIST: "The
city of Vancouver has come out swinging at Ivan Henry, implying he
deserves little compensation for his wrongful conviction for a series of
sexual assaults in the 1980s. In an aggressive statement in B.C.
Supreme Court, lawyer Bruce Quayle said city police should be judged
only by the standards of the last century and the City Analyst’s Lab
crime scene work should be considered little more than amateur forensics
— a self-taught expert working with makeshift equipment salvaged from
RCMP castoffs. Quayle maintained the lab was “understaffed,
underfunded, under-resourced and seemingly on the verge of
extinguishment at all times.” “The city defendants expect that the
evidence will demonstrate that it really was a different world back
then,” Quayle insisted. “They are not to be judged with hindsight by
today’s standards. So much of the evidence will be aimed at attempting
to show through … the mists of time what those standards were back
then.” With Henry’s lawyers having rested their case after nearly
two months, Quayle began the city’s defence by filing expert reports
that diminished the miscarriage of justice. Stephen Wormith, a
psychologist from the University of Saskatchewan, said that Henry was a
high-risk offender in 1980 with a 70 per cent chance of ending up back
behind bars within three years of his release even if he wasn’t
imprisoned indefinitely as a dangerous offender in 1983. But he
acknowledged in cross-examination that doing a risk-assessment after
three decades was novel territory and he was only providing actuarial
numbers, not a personal clinical evaluation of Henry. A second
report, by economic consultant Doug Hildebrand, opined that Henry’s 27
years of incarceration didn’t really amount to much in terms of lost
earnings — about $250,000 at most!.........Astoundingly,
Quayle said he plans to probably call 27 witnesses — mostly retired
police officers and a victim who didn’t testify at his trial but who
will appear 33 years later to point the finger. “She will testify
regarding among other things or primarily about the assault she
experienced in the early morning hours of June 8, 1982,” Quayle
explained, “the photo lineup that was shown to her and with which she
identified (Henry) as the man who had attacked her on that date. She’ll
talk about the preliminary inquiry, the reasons that she chose not to
return to Vancouver to testify at trial and she’ll speak about that
letter that she wrote to (Det. William) Harkema in the early part of the
spring of 1983 about which (Henry’s) counsel made such a big fuss a
month or so before the trial, my Lord.” Such evidence would fly in
the face of the Oct. 2010 B.C. Court of Appeal ruling that ordered
Henry acquitted of the sexual assaults, leading to this lawsuit for
compensation from the city, the province and the federal government for
their roles in his ordeal."
The entire story can be found at:
/news/mulgrew+vancouver+launches+fronts+attack+ivan+henry/11460632/story.html#ixzz3pPtq57iX
PUBLISHER'S NOTE:
Dear Reader. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog. We are following this case.
I
have added a search box for content in this blog which now encompasses
several thousand posts. The search box is located near the bottom of
the screen just above the list of links. I am confident that this
powerful search tool provided by "Blogger" will help our readers and
myself get more out of the site.
The
Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible
years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr.
Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of
Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic"
section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It
can be found at:
http://www.thestar.com/topic/charlessmith
Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at:
http://smithforensic.blogspot.ca/2013/12/the-charles-smith-award-presented-to_28.html
I look forward to hearing from readers at:
hlevy15@gmail.com;
Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog;