Friday, October 23, 2015
Bulletin: Ivan Henry; British Columbia; Ian Mulgrew; The Vancouver Sun: Ian Mulgrew: Vancouver launches all-fronts attack on Ivan Henry; " 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.”
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:
