COUNTDOWN: 9 DAYSTO GO; STARTLING REVELATIONS; PART FOUR;

NOTE TO READERS; I WOULD LIKE TO RECEIVE YOUR VIEWS ON KEY DEVELOPMENTS AND REVELATIONS AT THE GOUDGE INQUIRY: HAROLD LEVY;

As high noon (October 1, 2008) approaches I am focusing on some of the more startling revelations that rocked the Goudge Inquiry;

In recent weeks I have touched several startling revelations, including:

0: The introduction of an affidavit from Provincial Court judge Patrick Dunn which contradicts evidence given by Dr. Smith to the Commission; The intervention of a judge into a public inquiry is an extremely rare event;

0: Introduction from a letter from the Ontario Provincial Police to the Chief Coroner Dr. James Young alleging that Dr. Smith had attempted to intimidate an officer into not giving him a speeding ticket.

0: Dr. Smith's admission of bias; I always viewed Dr. Smith as a cheerleader for the prosecution - but I never dreamed that he would actually admit that he believed his job was to help the prosecution win the case. My only question was how far he would go to make this happen.

0: Maxine Johnson's potentially devastating testimony that she discovered the missing Mullins-Johnson's slides on a shelf in a location in Dr. Smith's office at the Hospital for Sick Children that had been searched months earlier;

0: Unexpected introduction of a letter from the Barrie, Ontario Police Service, which indicated that Smith, with the support of the Chief Coroner's Office, had agreed to participate in an electronic surveillance operation involving the mother of a deceased child.

0: Evidence of a damage control meeting conducted by the Hospital for Sick Children SCAN team following the rejection of its evidence by Judge Patrick Dunn in the Amber case.

Today's startling revelation relates to evidence that prosecutors induced Dinesh Kumar to plead guilty to criminal negligence causing the death of his son Gaurov (instead of murder) - even though Dr. Charles Smith and Dr. Dirk Huyer of the Hospital for Sick Children SCAN-team were "struggling" to find criminality in the case.

That evidence is discussed in a post which ran on June 7, 2008 under the heading: "Gaurov's Father: A Second Shocking Revelation From Goudge Inquiry; Both Smith And Huyer Were "Struggling" With Criminality In the Case;"

The section of transcript relating to this disclosure is found in lawyer James Lockyer's cross-examination of Dr. Helen Whitwell, the independent examiner who reviewed Gaurov's case at the request of former Chief Coroner, Dr. Barry McLellan;

It read, in part, as follows:

"MR. JAMES LOCKYER: And so in Gaurov's case, whilst we have -- the preexisting condition may have been responsible for what ultimately caused Gaurov's death, beyond that, potentially, as Dr. Pollanen has pointed out, we don't even seem to have the triad in the first place.

DR. HELEN WHITWELL: No, you don't.

MR. JAMES LOCKYER: I don't know quite why Dr. Smith said this, but he seems to have had a lot of trouble with the case himself, and we got some notes just a -- a few days ago in this regard. If we could go to PFP302155; And what we're looking at here is the notes of one (1) of the officers in charge of the case, Detective Lines (sic). And if you go -- could you -- I'm sorry, I don't have a page number here. Could you just keep -- keep moving and I'll tell you when to stop through these notes. We're looking for March 23rd, which you'll see at the top of one (1) of the pages. And if you look at the entry for 2:55 on March 23rd -- and if you could raise the page a little so we can go to the bottom of it -- what it says there, and this is Detective Lines, one (1) of the officers in charge, and what he's noted March 23rd of 1992, which is post-autopsy, he's noted: "Speak to pathologist, Dr. Charles Smith, of Sick Kids Hospital re.
update. Still is of the opinion that death was from either two (2) sources: shaken baby, blunt trauma. He has consulted with Dr. Huyer, SCAN program. They both have misgivings about criminal element. Quote, 'Has struggled with this being criminal. Agrees to meet with Mary Hall any time.' And I can just tell you, Dr. Whitwell, that Mary Hall was then a -- the head Crown attorney in the Scarborough office where --

DR. HELEN WHITWELL: Right.

MR. JAMES LOCKYER: -- out of which Mr. Kumar was prosecuted.
So it would seem, at least in the early days -- and this is before Gaurov's father is charged with the second degree murder of his son Gaurov -- that even after the autopsy, Dr. Smith, and indeed Dr. Huyer of the SCAN unit, to use the -- to use the quote, "struggling" with the question of whether any crime had
been committed in Gaurov's death in the first place. I don't think you would have known that. We only got this document about a week ago --

DR. HELEN WHITWELL: Right.

MR. JAMES LOCKYER: -- through -- through the officer himself providing it.

We are told that this note was written before Dinesh Kumar was encouraged by prosecutors to plead guilty to criminal negligence causing his son Gaurov's death in order to avoid being prosecuted for murder.

The existence of such a note - in which both Dr. Smith and the Head of the SCAN team are struggling to find any scientific evidence of criminality in the case - clearly raises the prospect that there was no reasonable possibility of obtaining a conviction.

The last time I looked at a Criminal Code - Criminal Negligence Causing Death was just what it sounded like: a very serious criminal offence.

So we have to wonder why the prosecutors who, as crown attorneys, also hold the function of being officers of the Court, proceeded to take Mr. Kumar to Court on any criminal charge at all - whether they were bound by the law to withdraw all charges against him or not.

A very shocking revelation indeed, which, it seems, only raised its ugly head publicly more than 16-years after Mr. Kumar pleaded guilty to an offence he did not commit, to avoid life in prison for murder on the evidence of the celebrated Dr. Smith's evidence supported by the world famous Hospital for Sick Children, to regain custody of his son, and to avoid deportation from Canada;

How could our Canadian Justice system fall so low?"
Harold Levy...levy15@gmail.com;