"IN SUMMARY, DR. SMITH BELIEVES THIS CHILD DIED AS A RESULT OF A NON-ACCIDENTAL BLUNT FORCE INJURY TO THE HEAD. AS WE HAVE STATED PREVIOUSLY THIS IS NOT CONSISTENT WITH THE STORY GIVEN BY THE MOTHER AT THE TIME AND I AM AWARE THAT YOUR DEPARTMENT IS STILL PURSUING THIS DEATH AS A CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION.
ACCORDINGLY, I WILL NOT BE GIVING THE FAMILY A COPY OF THIS AUTOPSY".
LETTER FROM DEPUTY CHIEF CORONER DR. JIM CAIRNS TO THE SUDBURY, ONTARIO,POLICE FORCE;
It was a last resort.
The Sudbury police force had thrown everything they could at Lianne Gagnon - but she hadn't buckled.
They grilled her but that didn't work.
She didn't confess.
They had tried to find incriminating evidence - a farewell letter Lianne had placed in Nicholas' casket - but there was no incriminating evidence there.
Just a grieving mother's farewell words to her dead son.
They had consulted a police "behaviouralist" who reviewed Lianne's initial statement, the transcript of her interrogation, and the letter from the casket.
Lots of theories, opinions and speculation - but no evidence.
None.
In desperation, they followed the police behaviorist's advice to enlist the support of Steven Tolin - Nicholas' father (separated from Lianne) - as one of a battery of psychological ploys aimed at getting Lianne to confess to the crime she so adamantly denied committing.
Here's how it happens, as detailed in an "overview report" on the case prepared by Goudge Inquiry staff.
On July 21, 1997, Detective Sergeant Keetch persuades Tolin to sign a consent to electronically intercept his conversations with Lianne. (No details of this conversation are set out in the Commission documents);
Two days later, Keetch obtains the authorization from Provincial Court Judge Mahaffy - the same judge who issued the search warrant for Nicholas' casket.
The authorization places Lianne's private communications with Tolin under secret state scrutiny for almost a month - until September 10, 1997.
On July 28, 1997, Tolin informs Lianne that Keetch has asked him to drop by the station the next day - regarding new developments in the investigation and they agree to speak after Tolin has met with the police.
(This is part of the plan created by Van Allen - the behaviouralist - to put Lianne on edge so that she will confess.")
The next day Steven gets ready to entrap Lianne.
He gets together with a member of the Sudbury force's technical support team who installs a recording device in the car, and wires him for sound.
The police case book tells us that:
"At 1847 hours on the 29 July, 1997, Tolin telephoned Gagno at her residence and the two agreed to meet. Tolin picked Gagnon up at her residence and drove her to the parking lot overlooking Bell Park where he became involved in a recorded conversation with her regarding the death of (Nicholas);
"Tolin returned Gagnon to her residence at 2006 hours and then proceeded to the police station where the recording devices were removed..."
We have not been told what Lianne told Steven that night while the recording devices did their nosy job - but it is clear that once again, the Sudbury police department's frontal assault on an innocent 23-year-old mother missed its target.
The last resort of the police efforts to find evidence on which to charge Lianne with murdering Nicholas - so that she could be put behind bars for life - had failed.
Lianne Gagnon's innocence had prevailed and now the end game between The police and Lianne was to be played out as the Dr. Charles Smith - determined after the second autopsy that Nicholas' death was not accidental;
As Deputy Chief Coroner Dr. Jim, Cairns put it in a letter to the Sudbury Chief of Police dated October 30, 1997:
"In summary, Dr. Smith believes this child died as a result of a non-accidental blunt force injury to the head. As we have stated previously this is not consistent with the story given by the mother at the time and I am aware that your department is still pursuing this death as a criminal investigation.
Accordingly, I will not be giving the family a copy of this autopsy.
If you have any further questions, do not hesitate to contact me, Dr. Smith and myself are available to you at any time for consultation during your further investigation."
Around the same time that the Chief Coroner's office was intensifying its conviction that Lianne was guilty, the force conducted several interviews which pointed to his innocence.
One was with Sophie Laframboise,a friend who attended at the hospital on November 30, 1995.
Laframboise told police, in a statement dated November 11, 1997, that when she babysat Nicholas a few days before his death, he fell forward and bumped his head.
"I think there was a bruise probably on the (left)side of his forehead," she said.
A week later, Lianne's mother noted in a statement that Nicholas fell and hit his head on Mrs. Marshall's coffee table about two weeks before his death, and his forehead was swollen and blue - and that Nicholas had fallen while Ms. Laframboise was watching him.
About three weeks later, the Sudbury Regional force informed the Gagnon family that criminal charges would not be pursued.
The "overview report" tells us that on March 28, 2000, Dr. Cairns advised the force that the cause and manner of death are now indicated as "undetermined" and that although the Chief Coroner's file was not closed - it was dormant, and that no further investigation was anticipated unless new information came to light.
"Dr. Cairns trusted this information would help the Sudbury Regional Police complete its file regarding the investigation of Nicholas' death," the document said.
When all is said and done, the Sudbury Regional Police force had it right when they originally concluded, as had the local coroner, that Nicholas' death was not suspicous.
It was only when Chief Coroner's Office got involved at the highest levels - and inserted Dr. Charles Smith in the case - that Lianne began to be viewed as a murder suspect.
From another perspective, Lianne Gagnon had become a pawn in an ideological controversy where the Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) - a well established syndrome - had fallen out of favour in that office, and suspicion of criminality (dirty thinking) was the order of the day.
But that doesn't take the Sudbury Police Force off the hook for its oppressive and destructive investigation of an innocent, young, single mother and her family.
Next Posting: Part Seven: Interrogation of an Innocent Mother; Inspector Robert Keetch's Remarkable Apology;
Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;
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