"Marquardt, 38, lost custody of boys Keith and Eric after she was convicted of murdering her son, Kenneth Wynne. That conviction was quashed in 2010, and on Tuesday, Marquardt was completely exonerated, after the Crown decided not to re-try her.
Marquardt says she has put her name on an adoption registry in hopes that her sons will be able to track her down if they come looking for her.
"I hope they will find me but I'm not going to force myself on them because the last time they seen me, they were babies. They're teenagers now. Who would I be to just jump in their lives?" she told CTV's Canada AM Wednesday."
CTV NEWS;
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BACKGROUND: In february, 2011, The Ontario Court of Appeal quashed the murder conviction of the Toronto mother who was imprisoned for life on the basis of flawed testimony from pathologist Charles Smith. “We recognize this has been a terrible ordeal for you and it’s tragic it has taken so long to uncover the flawed pathology that led to your conviction in 1995,”Justice Marc Rosenberg told Tammy Marquardt Thursday morning. “We agree … there was a miscarriage of justice,” Rosenberg said on behalf of a three-judge panel. The 38-year-old Scarborough native spent nearly 14 years in prison after being convicted of murdering her 2-year-old son, Kenneth Wynne. While other victims of Smith’s mistakes have since been acquitted, Marquardt’s “dilemma” is that fresh evidence in her case only allows a court to go as far as ordering a new trial, Lockyer told the court. The evidence is still ambiguous about how the child died but strongly suggests he died as a result of an epileptic seizure, Lockyer said. In his short life, Kenneth had suffered from asthma and pneumonia and had been treated for seizures eight times. Smith opined the cause of death was asphyxia, likely the result of smothering or suffocation. That remains a possibility, given an absence of hard evidence about why Kenneth died, the appeal court was told on Thursday. At the same time, two neurologists from the Hospital for Sick Children who independently examined the boy’s medical records found his demise was consistent with a sudden unexplained death from epileptic seizure. While three-judge panel set aside Marquardt’s conviction, the Crown has not indicated whether it intends to proceed with a new trial. The court, meanwhile, extended Marquardt’s bail. The appeal court decision came after forensic experts reviewed the conclusions of the former pediatric pathology superstar and found them illogical and “completely” unscientific. Smith’s evidence dovetailed with the Crown’s theory at the time, that Marquardt had suffocated Kenneth in a moment of anger and frustration. But he was wrong in supporting the Crown’s theory and his testimony denied the jury the option of concluding the child had instead died as a result of a seizure, Crown counsel Gillian Roberts told the court. Marquardt said she found him twisted up in bed sheets and obviously distressed. He was taken to hospital, but died three days later, after being taken off life support. Nearly two years ago, Marquardt was released on bail. She had been incarcerated in the Grand Valley women’s prison in Kitchener. Kenneth died 17 years ago, in October, 1993. Her other sons, who she named Keith and Eric, live somewhere in Canada, but never had further contact with their mother.
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"Tammy Marquardt, the Ontario woman who was wrongfully imprisoned for 14 years in the death of her two-year-old son, says she hopes to find her two other sons, who were put up for adoption after her arrest," the CTV NEWS story filed earlier today under the heading, "Marquardt wants to find sons put up for adoption," begins.
"Marquardt, 38, lost custody of boys Keith and Eric after she was convicted of murdering her son, Kenneth Wynne. That conviction was quashed in 2010, and on Tuesday, Marquardt was completely exonerated, after the Crown decided not to re-try her," the story continues.
"Marquardt says she has put her name on an adoption registry in hopes that her sons will be able to track her down if they come looking for her.
"I hope they will find me but I'm not going to force myself on them because the last time they seen me, they were babies. They're teenagers now. Who would I be to just jump in their lives?" she told CTV's Canada AM Wednesday.
Marquardt was convicted based on the testimony of now-disgraced pathologist Charles Smith, who decided that the young mother likely smothered her son. But she always maintained her innocence.
After a public inquiry revealed that Smith repeatedly offered misguided court testimony that sent several innocent people to jail, Marquardt's case was re-examined.
At least five experts have since repudiated Smith's findings, suggesting Kenneth likely died from an epileptic seizure and entanglement in his sheets. The experts concluded the cause of death should have been recorded as "unascertained."
Marquardt blames Smith for her wrongful conviction but also for the loss of her sons, one of whom was born while she was in Kingston's Prison for Women and seized from her within hours of his birth.
"For me, I feel like Keith and Eric were kidnapped in a sense, because had he (Smith) not done this to me, I'd have my boys," she says.
Marquardt says she hopes Smith suffers the way she has.
"I hope you live your own personal hell for what you put all of us through," Marquardt said when asked what she would say to Smith if she had the chance.
Smith was stripped of his medical licence earlier this year, after pleading no contest to charges of disgraceful conduct. Most of the convictions from cases in which he testified have since been overturned.
While Marquardt says she blames Smith, she also blames the police and court system.
"It wasn't just him. We can't just blame the one person. It was the whole system. They're the ones who were brushing me under the carpet," she said.
Marquardt says she still can't believe her 17-year-long ordeal is finally over.
"I don't think the reality has actually sunk in yet. I'm still a little afraid I'm going to wake up and still be in my nightmare," she said.
Marquardt, who was released from prison in 2009, now has a nine-month-old daughter, named Tiffany, and is engaged to be married. But she says she still grapples with terrible emotional pain.
"The only way I can describe the feeling of it is to have your heart ripped out and have someone hold it in front of you, basically, until it stops beating. The pain is so deep that there are no words," she said.
With the worry of being tried again now lifted and her name now cleared, Marquardt says she wants to focus on the future.
"I wouldn't say I can get my life back, but I can move on from here. I can't really pick up the pieces that were lost," she said.
"I'm really hoping to move forward.""
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The story can be found at:
http://www.ctv.ca/CTVNews/TopStories/20110608/Tammy-marquardt-wrongfully-convicted-110608/
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PUBLISHER'S NOTE: 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.com/2011/05/charles-smith-blog-award-nominations.html
Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog; hlevy15@gmail.com;
