Motherisk: Ontario; Aftermath (2) ; Columnist Michele Mandel's take on The Hospital for Sick Children's 'victims of bad science.' (Toronto Sun)..." From 2005 to 2015, the Motherisk Laboratory at Sick Kids tested more than 24,000 hair samples for drugs and alcohol from over 16,000 different people, a side business that reportedly generated $1.3 million a year. It was the gold standard used in court by child welfare agencies to justify their apprehension orders. Like the once respected pathologist Charles Smith, also from Sick Kids, the evidence entered by the venerable hospital’s lab was treated as sacrosanct."

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: Excellent commentary by Michele Mandel Toronto Sun which recognizes the failure of Toronto's once-renowned Hospital for Sick Children to learn from the Charles Smith debacle, which also wreaked havoc on families, divided them, and led to miscarriages of justice. Yes. Same hospital. Same desperation to protect its undeserved public image. Another very black chapter in Ontario's history where the  Ontario government failed to protect vulnerable parents. (I am unable to reduce this commentary as it is so tightly written.)

Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "How is it that after the Charles Smith debacle, Sick Kids seems to have learned nothing at all?"

---------------------------------------------------------------------

QUOTE OF THE DAY:  "Many can’t imagine how we feel or what we go through everyday. To grieve the loss of a loved one who has not passed. The endless sadness and missing pieces of hearts. We no longer feel whole but lost. The sleepless nights with flashbacks and nightmares. The loss of trust in humanity and the anxiety that it accompanies. The constant fear of, well … everything. It has broken our lives and relationships that go beyond just the parent and child(ren). We have been violated, and we can’t forget a moment of it. “I lay in my bed behind a closed door and shed my tears everyday/night. On the outside one may think I’m fine, but inside I scream and relive moments of horror. They’ve taken even the simplest task from parents. To love and protect them. What these people have done is irreparable. One day I only hope I can forgive, but I will never forget.”

From a statement signed as “an extremely broken mother.”

----------------------------------------------------------------------

COMMENTARY:  "Victims of bad science at Motherisk want their kids back," by columnist Michele Mandel. published by The Toronto Sun on February 28, 2018.

GIST: "Return their children. That’s what they want — the parents who saw their kids ripped away based on flawed alcohol and drug hair tests from the now shuttered Motherisk lab at the famous Sick Children’s hospital. A report tabled this week examined  1,270 cases handled by the lab going back more than two decades and found 56 clear cases where Motherisk’s flawed test results had a “substantial impact” on the decision to remove children — though critics argue there are far more. Of those 56 cases, only four have resulted in the kids being reunited with their families. The rest are likely lost forever to their adoptive parents. “Help get our kids back that were taken in the first place,” wrote one mother on a Facebook support group. “These were babies, now they are six and four. You can’t give us back the time and memories we have lost. I am so bitter, and angry and this ALL over money and BS.” From 2005 to 2015, the Motherisk Laboratory at Sick Kids tested more than 24,000 hair samples for drugs and alcohol from over 16,000 different people, a side business that reportedly generated $1.3 million a year. It was the gold standard used in court by child welfare agencies to justify their apprehension orders. Like the once respected pathologist Charles Smith, also from Sick Kids, the evidence entered by the venerable hospital’s lab was treated as sacrosanct. The case of Tamara Bloomfield blew the lid off that erroneous assumption. She was labelled Toronto’s “crack mom” for supposedly feeding cocaine to her son. But in 2014, the Ontario Court of Appeal overturned her conviction after new evidence cast serious doubt on the faulty science behind the Motherisk hair testing results. Following an investigative series by the Toronto Star, retired Justice Susan E. Lang was tasked by the Ontario government to review Motherisk’s lab procedures. Her damning report in 2015 found its hair strand drug and alcohol testing was “inadequate and unreliable” for use in child protection, determining it lacked oversight and wasn’t even accredited as a forensic laboratory to carry out testing for legal purposes. The province ordered children’s aid agencies to stop relying on hair testing and told Sick Kids to shut down the Motherisk lab.  For many families, it all came far too late. “This means that even where the discredited Motherisk hair testing substantially

affected the outcome of a case, the family will likely have difficulty bringing about a change in the children’s living arrangements,” warned commissioner Judith Beaman in her report released Monday.
“The decisions we make in child protection are often devastating and irrevocable,” she wrote. “That is why it is critical that only reliable evidence and a fair process be used in the service of making those decisions.” Many parents have filed lawsuits against the lab; an effort to file a class-action suit was dismissed last fall. One mother took to her support group to decry what this scandal has done to families like hers. Her words cut to the heart. “What no one reads, no one knows, or no one understands, is the extent of the trauma it has caused. Many can’t imagine how we feel or what we go through everyday. To grieve the loss of a loved one who has not passed,” she wrote. “The endless sadness and missing pieces of hearts. We no longer feel whole but lost. The sleepless nights with flashbacks and nightmares. The loss of trust in humanity and the anxiety that it accompanies. The constant fear of, well … everything. It has broken our lives and relationships that go beyond just the parent and child(ren). We have been violated, and we can’t forget a moment of it. “I lay in my bed behind a closed door and shed my tears everyday/night. On the outside one may think I’m fine, but inside I scream and relive moments of horror. They’ve taken even the simplest task from parents. To love and protect them. What these people have done is irreparable. One day I only hope I can forgive, but I will never forget.” She signed herself “an extremely broken mother.” Why does this all sound so familiar? How is it that after the Charles Smith debacle, Sick Kids seems to have learned nothing at all?"

The entire commentary can be read at:

http://torontosun.com/news/local-news/mandel-victims-of-bad-science-at-motherrisk

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. 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 Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy; Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.

Motherisk: Ontario: Aftermath (1): CTV National News tells the story of a father's pain on losing his daughter after a test conducted by the now-defunct, terribly flawed, discredited Hospital for Sick Children (the hospital that also gave us discredited now-defunct pathologist Charles Smith) hair analysis program..."I haven't seen her in almost six years," the father says... " Accused of being a drug user, the man was told that he had to undergo a hair test before he could have access to his chilld. “The results came back with cocaine and crack and methamphetamines in my system,” the man said. “I almost passed out and hit the floor when I saw the results, because it was so totally untrue. In my lifetime, I have never used any of those drugs.” The CAS case workers, however, stood by the now-discredited test, the man said. “After a couple of months and a couple more tests, I ended up losing access rights to my daughter,” he lamented. “She was put up for adoption and I haven’t seen her since she was two years old.” Nearly six years later, the man still mourns the fact that he can’t watch his daughter grow up. “She doesn’t get to visit with her brothers or sisters,” he said. “She never got to meet her grandmother or grandfather… She never got a chance to do things with her dad.” The man dreams of being reunited with his little girl, but believes the chances of that happening are “slim to none.” “It’s been so many years now, I don’t think she would know who I was anymore,” he explained. “And with all the court systems and the CAS matters, I don’t feel that will ever happen.” Tragically, he may be right."

PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "In a statement emailed to CTV News, the Victims & Survivors of Motherisk Facebook group blasted the independent commission into Motherisk for not consulting "disposed" parents, like the unnamed father. “Victims did not get to participate in the commission,” the statement said. “I don’t think the commission’s report is fair at all to the stolen children or their families… How are we as a province and country going to prevent this from occurring again in the future without a true public inquiry?”

HEADING:  "I haven't seen her in almost six years': Father on pain of losing daughter after Motherisk test," by reporter Daniel Otis, published by CTV News on February 26, 2018.

GIST: "As an independent commission in Ontario released a report Monday slamming Motherisk’s hair analysis program, which led to an untold number of children being taken away from their parents after they failed the now-discredited drug-screening test, one father is speaking up about how the program “destroyed” his family when it stripped them of their little girl. "I feel I was treated wrongly and unfairly and they accused me of something that I didn’t do,” the man, who cannot be identified because of child privacy laws, told CTV News. “And it’s the little girl who suffers more out of all this than myself and my family.” According to the man, his daughter was taken to a Children’s Aid Society (CAS) location by her mother when she was just eight-months-old. Accused of being a drug user, the man was told that he had to undergo a hair test before he could have access to his chilld. “The results came back with cocaine and crack and methamphetamines in my system,” the man said. “I almost passed out and hit the floor when I saw the results, because it was so totally untrue. In my lifetime, I have never used any of those drugs.” The CAS case workers, however, stood by the now-discredited test, the man said. “After a couple of months and a couple more tests, I ended up losing access rights to my daughter,” he lamented. “She was put up for adoption and I haven’t seen her since she was two years old.” Nearly six years later, the man still mourns the fact that he can’t watch his daughter grow up. “She doesn’t get to visit with her brothers or sisters,” he said. “She never got to meet her grandmother or grandfather… She never got a chance to do things with her dad.” The man dreams of being reunited with his little girl, but believes the chances of that happening are “slim to none.” “It’s been so many years now, I don’t think she would know who I was anymore,” he explained. “And with all the court systems and the CAS matters, I don’t feel that will ever happen.” Tragically, he may be right. “The decisions we make in child protection are often devastating and irrevocable,” retired provincial court judge Judith Beaman, who led the independent commission into Motherisk, said on Monday. "That is why it is critical that only reliable evidence and a fair process be used in the service of making those decisions." “There’s lots of people out there like me,” the man added. “I hope they can somehow, someway reunite these families with their children.” Still, the man said that he is planning on filing a lawsuit following revelations about Motherisk’s faulty drug-testing methods. “There is no way to put a price or a figure or anything on a child,” he acknowledged. “She’s gone. I haven’t seen her in almost six years.” Nothing, he added, will ever erase the pain of losing his daughter. “Motherisk indeed destroyed my family,” he said. “If they didn’t do these faulty tests or agree with the Children’s Aid to do these faulty tests, we would still have my daughter right now and she would still be able to play and she’d be able to see her family.” In a statement emailed to CTV News, the Victims & Survivors of Motherisk Facebook group blasted the independent commission into Motherisk for not consulting "disposed" parents, like the unnamed father. “Victims did not get to participate in the commission,” the statement said. “I don’t think the commission’s report is fair at all to the stolen children or their families… How are we as a province and country going to prevent this from occurring again in the future without a true public inquiry?”

The entire story can be found at:
https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/i-haven-t-seen-her-in-almost-six-years-father-on-pain-of-losing-daughter-after-motherisk-test-1.3820345

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. 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 Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy; Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.

Jeffry Havard: Mississippi: Part five: Photographer Isabelle Armand found a novel way of expressing her sadness that Levon Brooks and Kennedy Brewer spent a combined three decades in prison for rapes and murders they didn’t commit through photographs, to appear in her new book "Levon and Kennedy: Mississippi Innocence Project. Controversial former medical examiner Steven Hayne along with dentist Michael West, played a role in their case. (Hayne also played a dubious role in the prosecution of Steven Havard)..."Armand read an article about Levon and Kennedy in 2012, four years after their release from prison when DNA led authorities to a man who confessed to both murders. “I was shocked that these men could be convicted by the testimony of two men who seemed to make a living testifying in murder cases,” Armand says, referring to Steven Hayne, Mississippi’s primary pathologist in the late 1980s and early ’90s, and dentist Michael West.“If you read this in a book of fiction, you would say there was no way it could happen."

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: Jeffrey Havard.has been on Mississippi's death row for 15 years. At the heart of the case, according to Circuit Court Judge Forrest  "Al" Johnson, is the now widely discredited so-called shaken-baby syndrome.  (Note also  the presence in the case of  controversial former medical examiner Steven Hayne who has repudiated his initial opinion); Think of it, a man's life may be taken by the state of Mississippi because of a highly disputed theory on which experts are widely divided,  which has been repudiated by  the late British Dr. Norman Guthkelch, the pediatric neurosurgeon,  who propagated it in the first place. The good news is that Judge Forest clearly recognizes the importance of this decision -  not just to Jeffrey Havard, whose life is in the balance. As Johnson is quoted: ""I don't anticipate sitting in this too long before I render a decision," Johnson said. "It's a pretty important case. It's a pretty big deal."  I will continue to monitor developments in this case closely.

Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.

-----------------------------------------------------------.

QUOTE OF THE DAY:  “We think this story has national relevance, and we hope the book sheds light on the problem that isn’t just in Mississippi but throughout our justice system,” Carrington says. “We need to know the entire story so that we can all do a better job.”

Author Tucker Carrington;  (Co-author, along with Radley Balko, of a book on  the  brutal Brooks and Brewer prosecution called "“The Cadaver King and the Country Dentist: A True Story of Injustice in the American South.”)

-----------------------------------------------------------------

STORY: "Not guilty: Photos tell powerful story of men wrongly convicted of murders, rapes," by reporter Billy Watkins, published by  The Clarion Ledger on February 15, 2018.

PHOTO CAPTION: "Levon Brooks and Kennedy Brewer of Noxubee County had the prime of their lives taken from them." 

 

PHOTO CAPTION: "Levon Brooks, left, and Kennedy Brewer of Noxubee County spent a combined three decades in prison for rapes and murders they did not commit. They were exonerated and released in 2008. Levon died of cancer on Jan. 24 of this year."

GIST: "Off and on for four years, photographer Isabelle Armand traveled from the deafening noise of New York City to the haunting quiet of east central Mississippi. Armand was sad and angry that two men from Noxubee County — Levon Brooks and Kennedy Brewer — spent a combined three decades in prison for rapes and murders they didn’t commit. She was inspired by their forgiving attitudes and their quests to make the most of what life they had left. She was touched, too, by what she saw through her lens every time she took their picture: “Magic,” Armand says. “They had a very strong faith, and I kept thinking, ‘People don’t really know who Levon and Kennedy are or what they’ve been through.’ ” Armand’s photographs will appear in her book — “Levon and Kennedy: Mississippi Innocence Project” — scheduled for release on March 27. Tucker Carrington, director of the George C. Cochran Innocence Project at the University of Mississippi School of Law, provided the text. Carrington has also co-written a book with Radley Balko about the two men’s convictions — along with several other cases throughout the 1980s and ’90s — and the junk science that cost these men the prime of their lives. “The Cadaver King and the Country Dentist: A True Story of Injustice in the American South” is due out Feb. 27. Levon Brooks' favorite aunt, Doris, who died in September 2017  Courtesy Isabelle Armand Armand and Carrington wish their books could have been released earlier. Levon died Jan. 24 after a long battle with colon cancer. He was 58. “Levon did get to see my book,” Armand says. “I’m so glad of that. He received a copy the same day I did — around Dec. 15. He told me he was taking it around (Macon) and showing it to everyone. I knew then he was proud of it. “And that makes me even happier that the book exists. I’m glad Levon’s legacy and Kennedy’s legacy will always be there for people to see.” "From the get-go, I was inspired to tell their story through photographs. But I didn’t know them and didn’t know if they would cooperate.” Armand wrote to Carrington, whose work helped exonerate the two men, and asked for his help. “I get requests like this all the time,” Carrington says. “But a lot of times the people are in it for themselves or they’re not very talented. But Isabelle sent along some of her work. She’s a fantastic photographer. And she was persistent. “I talked to Kennedy and Levon about it, and they agreed to do it. I told Isabelle, ‘I will introduce you to them, but you have to make your own way.’ She came down (in 2013) and we drove to Macon and ate lunch with them at Levon’s favorite place — Trail Boss. Isabelle wound up staying for three weeks.” Armand recalls that first trip to see them: “We hit it off. We hung out a lot. And for me, it was love at first sight when it came to Mississippi and Levon and Kennedy and their families. “I wanted to show people their lives, where they grew up, the places that meant a lot to them as children.” Levon and Kennedy soon seemed to forget that Armand was always snapping pictures. They lived life and Armand captured it on film.  “Yes, film,” she says. “I wanted black and white photos because that’s the only way to capture depth of field, and I don't think you can get that as well with a digital camera.” Armand took thousands of photos — more than 900 on her initial trip. She had to select 72 for the book.  One final photo:  Near the end of her work, Armand realized there was one photo she hadn’t yet taken: Levon and Kennedy together, just the two of them. “Those moments of taking that picture, which is on the cover, will stay with me forever,” she says. “We went to this little cafe of Levon’s. I wanted something very meaningful and I got it. A lot of people think they’re just looking at the camera, but to me they’re looking at the world.” Armand hopes her book makes people “care a little more” and “helps raise awareness that innocent people — good people — are being sent to prison for no reason.” Carrington’s book is more about the court process that led to their conviction. It focuses on Hayne and West and their frequent collaborations. Levon and Kennedy were convicted primarily on West’s claim that their bite marks matched wounds found on the victims. During a deposition in 2010, West told Tucker: “I don’t believe in bite-mark evidence anymore.” “I could’ve fallen out of my chair,” Carrington says. In 2010, the Innocence Project asked the Mississippi State Board of Medical Licensure to look at Hayne’s medical license. Hayne sued the Innocence Project for defamation of character. The case settled. Kennedy and Levon sued Hayne and West but lost when it was ruled that the two had immunity for public policy reasons. “We think this story has national relevance, and we hope the book sheds light on the problem that isn’t just in Mississippi but throughout our justice system,” Carrington says. “We need to know the entire story so that we can all do a better job.”

The entire story - with some of the amazing photographs from the book - can be read  at:

https://www.clarionledger.com/story/magnolia/books/2018/02/15/mississippi-books-photos-tell-story-wrongly-convicted-men/331625002/

Read  also related Clarion Ledger story by reporter Billy Watkins  at the  link below: "Brooks’ arrest and conviction were due to “government misconduct and unvalidated or improper forensic science,” according to a report by the Innocence Project. Brooks was accused of taking the 3-year-old daughter of his ex-girlfriend from her home on the night of Sept. 15, 1990. Her body was found in a pond 80 yards from her house. Pathologist Steven Hayne performed an autopsy on the girl and claimed there were human bite marks on her wrists. He brought in Michael West to testify. West was a dentist who claimed to be a bite mark expert, even though bite marks had never been scientifically validated. West said the marks could only have been made by Brooks’ two front teeth. That was the prime reason he was found guilty. “Levon even had an alibi,” says his longtime friend Mary Kay Jones. “He worked at a nightclub in Macon and didn’t get off until 3 a.m. “Seemed like to me the police wanted somebody to pinpoint and get the case solved. They chose Levon.” The Innocence Project later discovered that Hayne performed between 1,200 and 1,800 autopsies a year — six times the professional standard — and was earning more than a million dollars annually. Hayne would usually call on West to provide testimony at other trials. One of those was an eerily similar case to Brooks’ that also happened in Noxubee County in 1992. Hayne claimed the body of a 3-year-old girl, who was raped, murdered and thrown into a water-filled ditch just a few hundred feet from her home, had human bite marks on it. West testified that the marks could only have been made by the teeth of Kennedy Brewer, who was dating the girl’s mother. Brewer spent three years in jail before going to trial. Brewer was convicted of capital murder and sent to death row. He spent 13 years in Parchman. Kennedy Brewer was convicted of capital murder in 1995 and sentenced to death for raping and killing 3-year-old Christine Jackson. He spent 15 years in jail before being cleared. Just as Brooks had done, Brewer proclaimed his innocence throughout. In 2001, DNA tests proved Brooks was not the killer and his conviction was overturned. He remained in jail, however, because the prosecutors said they intended to retry him. Attorneys with the Innocence Project traced the DNA to Justin Albert Johnson, a neighbor of the girl Brewer supposedly murdered. Johnson was already in prison and confessed to killing both girls. He is serving a life sentence."

https://www.clarionledger.com/story/news/2018/02/15/wrongfully-convicted-levon-brooks-extraordinary-man/336210002/

Read the Register of Exonerations entry for Levon Brooks and "Kennedy Brewer (by Alexandra Gross)  at the link below: "On September 15, 1990, 3-year-old Courtney Smith was taken from her bed in the middle of the night.  Her body was found two days later in a pond near her home in Brooksville, Mississippi; she had been raped and murdered. Police investigating the crime interviewed Courtney’s 5-year-old sister, Ashley, who said she saw Levon Brooks, her mother’s ex-boyfriend, take Courtney from her bed.  The room was dark, but Ashley said she saw Brooks by the light of the television in the next room. Ashley then identified Brooks from a photo lineup.  Brooks swore he had nothing to do with Courtney’s death, but he was arrested and charged with her murder. At Brooks’s trial in 1992, District Attorney Forrest Allgood called witnesses who testified that marks found on Courtney’s body were bite marks that connected Brooks to the murder. The pathologist who conducted the autopsy, Dr. Steven Hayne, testified that marks found on Courtney’s wrist were human bites, and a dentist, Dr. Michael West, testified that the bites matched Brooks’s teeth.  On January 22, 1992, Brooks was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison.In October 1999, Brooks appealed to the Mississippi Supreme Court, but his conviction was affirmed.  For the next nine years, Brooks remained in prison with little hope for a new trial, but in 2007, new evidence in a similar case – the 1992 rape and murder of 3-year-old Christine Jackson – shed light on Courtney’s murder.  Kennedy Brewer had been convicted of Christine Jackson’s murder in 1995, also based on bite-mark testimony from Drs. Hayne and West.  The Mississippi Innocence Project, which was representing Brewer, then took on Brooks’s case as well.  In 2007, the Innocence Project’s investigations led them to Justin Albert Johnson, a 51-year-old man with a history of sexual assaults against girls and women, who had been living near both Courtney Smith and Christine Jackson when they were abducted and murdered.  DNA testing conducted by the Innocence Project linked Johnson to Christine Jackson’s murder – though evidence from Courtney Smith’s murder was too degraded to be tested. When Johnson was arrested in February 2008, he confessed to both murders and told the authorities that he had committed the crimes on his own.  A judge vacated the convictions of both Brewer and Brooks at a hearing on February 15, 2008, and Brooks was released on his own recognizance (Brewer had been out on bond since 2007). Prosecutors dismissed all charges against Brooks on March 13 of that year.  The men were each granted $500,000 in statutory compensation from the state of Mississippi. By the time Brewer and Brooks were released, Dr. Hayne and Dr. West had become highly controversial for their shoddy work and inappropriately close relationships with state prosecutors, and they are suspected of providing false medical testimony in numerous cases.  The National Association of Medical Examiners says doctors should perform no more than 250 autopsies per year; Dr. Hayne has admitted to performing between 1,200 and 1,800 autopsies annually. Dr. West became particularly infamous for repeatedly providing false bite-mark testimony.  He was the subject of investigative reports by 60 Minutes and ABC News; in 1994 he resigned from the American Academy of Forensic Science when the organization began an ethics investigation against him.  In 2009, Brewer and Brooks jointly filed a civil lawsuit against West and Hayne for $18 million dollars. That lawsuit was dismissed in 2014 after a judge ruled that West and Haynes were immune from damages. The Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals upheld the dismissal in 2017. The state of Mississippi paid Brooks $500,000 in compensation. Brooks died in January 2018 after battling colon cancer for five years."

 http://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Pages/casedetail.aspx?caseid=3058

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. 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 Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy; Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.

Jeffrey Havard: Mississippi; Part Four: 'Reason' - an excellent libertarian magazine - presents an adaption from a chapter centered on Jeffrey Havard in the recently released book by Radley Balko and Tucker Carrington called "'The cadaver king and the country dentist." The adaption is rightly headed, "This Man Is on Death Row for Killing a 6-Month-Old. But What If We're Wrong About Shaken Baby Syndrome? A controversial medical examiner, exaggerated testimony, and bad forensics branded Jeffrey Havard a rapist and a baby killer.

PUBLISHER'S NOTE:  Jeffrey Havard has been on Mississipi's death row for 15 years. At the heart of the case, according to Circuit Court Judge Forrest  "Al" Johnson, is the now widely discredited so-called shaken-baby syndrome.  (Note  the presence in the  case of controversial former medical examiner Steven Hayne who has repudiated his initial opinion); Think of it, a man's life may be taken by the state of Mississippi because of a highly disputed theory on which experts are widely divided,  which has been repudiated by  the late British Dr. Norman Guthkelch, the pediatric neurosurgeon,  who propagated it in the first place. The good news is that Judge Forest clearly recognizes the importance of this decision -  not just to Jeffrey Havard, whose life is in the balance. As Johnson is quoted: ""I don't anticipate sitting in this too long before I render a decision," Johnson said. "It's a pretty important case. It's a pretty big deal."  I will continue to monitor developments in this case closely.

Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.

----------------------------------------------------------

PASSAGE OF THE DAY:

"Hayne has since come under intense scrutiny for taking on improbable workloads and for giving testimony that at times has stretched the bounds of science. In fact, courts have thrown out his testimony in several cases, and he has been barred from doing autopsies for the state of Mississippi. In another shaken baby syndrome trial six years after Havard's conviction—well after the problems with the diagnosis were known—Hayne cited a study that does not appear to exist, and referred to a forensic pathology textbook that says the precise opposite of what he claimed in court. "I don't know how he could have honestly misread it," the textbook's author would later declare."

----------------------------------------------------------------------




PUBLISHER'S NOTE: (2): Here is a portion of the excerpt from this newly published book by Radley Balko and Ticker Carrington. It will give the reader a taste of their take on the Havard case. Bit I do recommend that you read the entire excerpt at the link below. A truly important, revealing piece of literature. HL)...(Reason was founded in 1968 by Lanny Friedlander (1947–2011)^[2][5] as a more-or-less monthly mimeographed publication. In 1970 it was purchased by Robert W. Poole, Jr., Manuel S. Klausner, and Tibor R. Machan, who set it on a more regular publishing schedule.^[5] As the monthly print magazine of "free minds and free markets", it covers politics, culture, and ideas with a mix of news, analysis, commentary, and reviews.)

ADAPTION: "This Man Is on Death Row for Killing a 6-Month-Old. But What If We're Wrong About Shaken Baby Syndrome?, from the recently published book 'The cadaver king and the country dentist: True story of injustice in the American South: ' by Radley Balko  and Tucker Carrington," published by  in the April 2018 edition of ''Reason.'  Forward by John Grisham;   (Radley Balko is a journalist at The Washington Post. Tucker Carrington is the director of the Mississippi Innocence Project.)

SUB-HEADING:  "A controversial medical examiner, exaggerated testimony, and bad forensics branded Jeffrey Havard a rapist and a baby killer.
GIST: "The concept of shaken baby syndrome has, in fact, come under scrutiny over the last decade. It's obviously true that shaking too hard can kill a fragile newborn—that's not disputed. But prosecutors have become reliant on the idea that if a trio of specific symptoms are found in a dead child, the death could only have been caused by violent shaking. Those symptoms are bleeding at the back of the eye, bleeding in the protective area of the brain, and brain swelling. This is a convenient diagnosis, since it provides prosecutors with a method of homicide (shaking), a likely suspect (the last person alone with the child), and intent (it is assumed that babies only die this way after exceptionally violent shaking). Yet new research has shown that falls, blows to the head, and even some illnesses and genetic conditions can cause the same set of symptoms. Many medical and legal authorities have therefore concluded that the trio of symptoms shouldn't be the sole basis of a conviction. Even the doctor who first came up with the theory has now expressed doubts about it. In most shaken baby syndrome cases, prosecutors would first file murder charges, then later allow the defendant to plead down to a lesser  charge like manslaughter. But sometimes they've gotten a murder conviction. In recent years, thanks to increasing doubt around the diagnosis, a number of these shaken baby convictions have been overturned, and many more are under review. A 2015 study by The Washington Post and Northwestern University's Medill Justice Project found more than 2,000 cases in which a defendant was charged with shaking a child. Of those, 200 have either been acquitted, had the charges dropped, or had their convictions overturned. The National Registry of Exonerations lists 14 people convicted because of a shaken baby diagnosis who were later cleared. Without DNA testing, however, it can be nearly impossible to overcome faulty forensic testimony—even when, on close examination, it turns out the courts went out of their way not to see problems with the arguments they were accepting.........After Jeffrey Havard was arrested, the court assigned him a public defender. His attorney asked the district court judge for funds to hire his own forensic pathologist, but the judge turned him down, finding that there was no need for a separate pathologist when Hayne was available. Hayne has since come under intense scrutiny for taking on improbable workloads and for giving testimony that at times has stretched the bounds of science. In fact, courts have thrown out his testimony in several cases, and he has been barred from doing autopsies for the state of Mississippi. In another shaken baby syndrome trial six years after Havard's conviction—well after the problems with the diagnosis were known—Hayne cited a study that does not appear to exist, and referred to a forensic pathology textbook that says the precise opposite of what he claimed in court. "I don't know how he could have honestly misread it," the textbook's author would later declare. Even at the time of Havard's trial, there was good reason for the defense attorney to want a second opinion. In other cases, Hayne had admitted under oath to doing 1,500 or more autopsies each year—nearly five times the absolute maximum recommended by the National Association of Medical Examiners. But the state's courts and prosecutors had been relying on Hayne for 15 years. Havard would have to rely on him, too. Though he had no prior history of abusing or molesting children, by the time Havard's trial began 10 months later, word had spread around Adams County, Mississippi, that he was a pedophile and baby killer.  Studies have shown not only that an eyewitness's memory can change over time, but that memories can be significantly altered with the acquisition of new information. Research supporting the idea of "reconstructive memory" in fact goes all the way back to the 1930s and the work of cognitive psychology pioneer Frederic Bartlett. This appears to be what happened in Havard's case, as some witnesses' memories grew considerably more vivid by the time of his trial. Jurors heard the sheriff, the coroner, and the hospital staff describe "tears," "rips," "lacerations," and other injuries to the child's anus. Some claimed to have seen blood. Two nurses said it was the worst example of anal trauma they had ever witnessed. Yet once the infant had been cleaned off, Hayne's autopsy photos showed no rips, tears, lacerations, or similar injuries anywhere on the girl's rectum—only the dilation and small contusion. Even the doctor who first came up with shaken baby syndrome has now expressed doubts about it. Despite his own photos, and despite the fact that his autopsy notes made no mention of sexual abuse, Hayne played up the bruise at trial. He told the jury that it was an inch long rather than a centimeter, as his report had said. While he conceded that he had found no tears or lacerations, he speculated that rigor mortis (the tightening of muscles after death) could have caused the girl's rectum to close and that this could have hidden any tears or cuts from his view. If he had really believed that, Hayne could have accounted for the possibility in his autopsy and looked more closely. He did neither. When asked what might have caused the small bruise, Hayne volunteered, "penetration of the rectum by an object." The examiner also testified that he'd found the symptoms of shaken baby syndrome and could conclude that Chloe had been "violently shaken" to death. To emphasize the point, Hayne and the prosecutor exchanged the phrase "violently shaken" an additional six times. The defense attorney wasn't exactly aggressive. The prosecution called 16 witnesses, whose testimonies comprise 261 pages of the trial transcript. Havard's lawyer called a single witness, a nurse at the E.R., whose testimony takes up three pages. The state didn't even bother to cross-examine him. It's hardly surprising, then, that the jury convicted Havard and sentenced him to die. The entire trial, deliberation, guilty verdict, sentencing trial, deliberation, and death sentence took two days."

The entire excerpt can - and should be read -  at the link below:
https://reason.com/archives/2018/02/27/junk-science-branded-him-a-rap

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. 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 Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy; Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.

Garr Keith Hardin: Kentucky: Jeffrey Dewayne Clark: Kentuck. Great news. (Exonerated at last); As the Louisville Courrier Journal reports (reporter Andrew Wolfson): "After 26 years, men accused in Satanic murder case are free."..." In 2016, Judge Butler granted the pair a new trial and freed them on bond, saying there was no credible evidence that Warford's murder was inspired by satanic worship, as the prosecution had contended, and that the convictions were "based on assumptions we now know to be totally false.” Meade Commonwealth’s Attorney David M. Williams and Assistant Attorney General Perry Ryan doubled down, not only vowing to retry the defendants but getting a grand jury to indict them on additional charges of perjury and kidnapping, making them potentially eligible for the death penalty. But Butler dismissed the new charges, saying they were vindictive, and Attorney General Andy Beshear’s office earlier this month moved to dismiss the case altogether, citing the prosecution’s duty to do justice. Hardin was represented by the Innocence Project in New York and Louisville attorney Larry Simon; Clark's lawyers from the Kentucky Innocence Project included Linda A. Smith, who retired on disability in December and couldn't attend Monday's hearing on account of her health." (Publisher's Note: A bravo to The Innocence Project in New York and all of the lawyers who persisted in achieving justice for these two men. A good look in the mirror to the police and prosecutors who persectued them. Kudos to Judge Bultler who just did his job and did it well. HL);

STORY: "After 26 years, men accused in Satanic murder case are free,by reporter Andrew Wolfson, published By The Louisville Courier Journal (USA TODAY Network) on February 26, 2018.

QUOTE OF THE DAY:  "Seema Saifa, a lawyer from the Innocence Project in New York, said in court that both men were convicted through "unconscionable misconduct" of police in the worst miscarriage of justice she'd ever seen. "They stole their youth but they couldn't take away their dignity," she said."

PASSAGE OF THE DAY:  "The defendants were convicted at a trial in Brandenburg, but over the years, the evidence against them collapsed. The FBI disclaimed hair matching as junk science, and DNA testing – which the commonwealth had fought against – show that the hair on Warford’s sweatpants belonged to neither defendant and the blood on Hardin’s handkerchief was his own – as he had always claimed. The jailhouse snitch’s testimony was discredited – he was shown to have perjured testimony against another defendant. And it turned out Handy had a track record of fabricating witness statements, most notably in a murder case against Edwin Chandler, who served nearly 10 years in prison largely because of Handy’s testimony before he was exonerated and collected an $8.5 million settlement from the city of Louisville. In 2016, Judge Butler granted the pair a new trial and freed them on bond, saying there was no credible evidence that Warford's murder was inspired by satanic worship, as the prosecution had contended, and that the convictions were "based on assumptions we now know to be totally false.”

------------------------------

STORY: "After 26 years, men accused in Satanic murder case are free,by reporter Andrew Wolfson, published By The Louisville Courier Journal (USA TODAY Network) on February 26, 2018

GIST: "They were both behind bars for more than 8,000 days — more than half their lives. Now they are free. After 26 years — and a 10-minute hearing Monday in Meade Circuit Court — a judge dismissed the murder case against Garr Keith Hardin and Jeffrey Dewayne Clark, who were convicted in 1995 in a case falsely linked to satanic worship. Both hugged their families and friends. Hardin's lawyers held his hand above his head like a heavyweight champion celebrating after a long bout.........Seema Saifa, a lawyer from the Innocence Project in New York, said in court that both men were convicted through "unconscionable misconduct" of police in the worst miscarriage of justice she'd ever seen. "They stole their youth but they couldn't take away their dignity," she said......... The saga began in the early morning hours of April 2, 1992, when Warford disappeared from Louisville. Three days later, on April 5, 1992, she was found stabbed to death in Meade County, about 50 miles from her home. The victim had spent April Fool’s Day, 1992, hanging with friends in a Kroger parking lot near her home. She told her mother that on the way home, a strange man followed and harassed her, shouting that he wanted to marry her.  But investigators from Louisville Metro Police and the Meade County sheriff’s office focused instead on Hardin, who had dated Rhonda, and his friend, Clark. Her mother told investigators that both men and her daughter had dabbled in satanic practices. Facing a gruesome murder with little physical evidence, the Louisville department assigned Detective Mark Handy to lead the investigation. Handy had a reputation as a closer who could wrest a confession out of anybody.  The suspects refused to confess, but Handy said Hardin admitted sacrificing animals as a part of a Satanic ritual and later decided that he wanted to “do a human.” The commonwealth also cited a bloodstained handkerchief found in Hardin’s home that detectives said had been used to clean up after animal sacrifices. The commonwealth's forensic examiner testified that a hair on Warford's sweatpants was a “microscopic match” to Hardin's hair. And Meade Sheriff Joseph Greer found a jailhouse informant who testified that Clark twice admitted to the murder. The defendants were convicted at a trial in Brandenburg, but over the years, the evidence against them collapsed. The FBI disclaimed hair matching as junk science, and DNA testing – which the commonwealth had fought against – show that the hair on Warford’s sweatpants belonged to neither defendant and the blood on Hardin’s handkerchief was his own – as he had always claimed. The jailhouse snitch’s testimony was discredited – he was shown to have perjured testimony against another defendant. And it turned out Handy had a track record of fabricating witness statements, most notably in a murder case against Edwin Chandler, who served nearly 10 years in prison largely because of Handy’s testimony before he was exonerated and collected an $8.5 million settlement from the city of Louisville. In 2016, Judge Butler granted the pair a new trial and freed them on bond, saying there was no credible evidence that Warford's murder was inspired by satanic worship, as the prosecution had contended, and that the convictions were "based on assumptions we now know to be totally false.” Meade Commonwealth’s Attorney David M. Williams and Assistant Attorney General Perry Ryan doubled down, not only vowing to retry the defendants but getting a grand jury to indict them on additional charges of perjury and kidnapping, making them potentially eligible for the death penalty. But Butler dismissed the new charges, saying they were vindictive, and Attorney General Andy Beshear’s office earlier this month moved to dismiss the case altogether, citing the prosecution’s duty to do justice. Hardin was represented by the Innocence Project in New York and Louisville attorney Larry Simon; Clark's lawyers from the Kentucky Innocence Project included Linda A. Smith, who retired on disability in December and couldn't attend Monday's hearing on account of her health. The matter is far from over. Clark and Hardin both filed lawsuits last year in U.S. District Court against Meade County and Louisville Metro government, as well as Handy and other detectives, accusing them of conspiring to wrongfully convict and imprison them.  “Their convictions rested on fabricated statements they never made and forensic evidence the prosecution wrongly argued Hardin left behind on the victim’s body,” the suits say. “Clark and Hardin’s wrongful convictions were not an accident but rather the result of police misconduct.” The attorney general’s office also said in a statement this month that it will continue to investigate Warford’s murder. Attorneys for Clark and Hardin also called for the attorney general's office to follow through on every case investigated by Handy, whom they say was responsible for the wrongful incarceration of three men. Handy retired from the Louisville department and is a sworn officer with the Jefferson County sheriff's department."

The entire story can be found at:  

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2018/02/26/after-26-years-men-accused-satanic-murder-case-free/375087002/
  
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. 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 Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy; Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.

Jeffrey Havard: Mississippi; Part Three: Associated Press reporter Jeff Amy who has covered politics and government for The Associated Press in Mississippi since 2011, gives his take on Radley Balko and Tucker Carrington's new book on Steven Hayne and Michael West 'The cadaver King and the country dentist' - and provides a very disturbing assessment of Hayne..."The authors conclude that Hayne was — at best — sloppy and overworked. At worst, they suggest he shaped his testimony to help convict people suspected of crimes by the police, instead of hewing to the science of what a dead body could tell him. The authors question "outrageous" claims that Hayne offered in some cases, such as a trial in a 2002 death when Hayne made a "death mask" of a boy's face and then claimed he had determined that the mask indicated that a man with a large hand had suffocated the child. The mother's boyfriend was convicted in the case."

PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "The authors think there needs to be a systemic re-evaluation of the cases where testimony by Hayne and West led to a conviction, but there's not even a good list of all such cases. When the Innocence Project filed public records requests to compile such a list in 2008, none of the state's district attorneys complied. Hood's office, meanwhile, has continued to defend work by Hayne and West. "They just have this reflexive, defiant posture that they were going to defend every case," Carrington said. The Mississippi Supreme Court, though, has begun to overturn or send back some cases, on a one-by-one basis."

PUBLISHER'S NOTE:  Jeffrey Havard has been on Mississipi's death row for 15 years. At the heart of the case, according to Circuit Court Judge Forrest  "Al" Johnson, is the now widely discredited so-called shaken-baby syndrome.  (Note  the presence in the  case of controversial former medical examiner Steven Hayne who has repudiated his initial opinion); Think of it, a man's life may be taken by the state of Mississippi because of a highly disputed theory on which experts are widely divided,  which has been repudiated by  the late British Dr. Norman Guthkelch, the pediatric neurosurgeon,  who propagated it in the first place. The good news is that Judge Forest clearly recognizes the importance of this decision -  not just to Jeffrey Havard, whose life is in the balance. As Johnson is quoted: ""I don't anticipate sitting in this too long before I render a decision," Johnson said. "It's a pretty important case. It's a pretty big deal."  I will continue to monitor developments in this case closely.

Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.

----------------------------------------------------------

COMMENTARY: Analysis: Book raises questions about criminal evidence," by Jeff Amy, published by Associated Press on February 24, 1018; ( Jeff Amy has covered politics and government for The Associated Press in Mississippi since 2011).

GIST: "It's not just about Steven Hayne and Michael West. That's one message from a new book examining the influence that Hayne, a pathologist, and West, a dentist who specialized in matching bite marks, had on Mississippi's justice system. "The Cadaver King and The Country Dentist," which goes on sale Tuesday, examines the work of Hayne and West, as well as prosecutors and judges who did little to stop or question their output for years. "There's a lot of blame to go around, and a lot of responsibility," said co-author Tucker Carrington, a University of Mississippi law professor who leads the Mississippi Innocence Project, which seeks to exonerate people who have been wrongfully convicted. He wrote the book along with journalist Radley Balko. The book details how coroners and prosecutors helped Hayne perform most autopsies in Mississippi. The authors conclude that Hayne was — at best — sloppy and overworked. At worst, they suggest he shaped his testimony to help convict people suspected of crimes by the police, instead of hewing to the science of what a dead body could tell him. The authors question "outrageous" claims that Hayne offered in some cases, such as a trial in a 2002 death when Hayne made a "death mask" of a boy's face and then claimed he had determined that the mask indicated that a man with a large hand had suffocated the child. The mother's boyfriend was convicted in the case. The book is even harder on West. Former state attorney general and supreme court chief justice Ed Pittman is among those quoted questioning the two. "I wish now that I had been more courageous," Pittman told Carrington in an interview. "A couple of those old cases embarrass me now. We should have been less accepting of Hayne and that culture." But the book asks why Attorney General Jim Hood and judges didn't do more to stop Hayne and West, or at least re-examine cases once their work came under fire. Chief Justice William Waller Jr. declined comment, while Hood didn't respond to a Friday request for comment. The authors think there needs to be a systemic re-evaluation of the cases where testimony by Hayne and West led to a conviction, but there's not even a good list of all such cases. When the Innocence Project filed public records requests to compile such a list in 2008, none of the state's district attorneys complied. Hood's office, meanwhile, has continued to defend work by Hayne and West. "They just have this reflexive, defiant posture that they were going to defend every case," Carrington said. The Mississippi Supreme Court, though, has begun to overturn or send back some cases, on a one-by-one basis. In October, justices overturned the murder convictions of Sherwood Brown in three 1993 killings, one case in which West testified. Since then, DNA evidence has shown that blood on the bottom of Brown's shoe didn't match the blood of any of the murder victims. In Columbus, a circuit judge has yet to rule after the Supreme Court granted a new hearing for Eddie Lee Howard, who has been twice convicted of the murdering an 84-year-old woman by stabbing her. At Brown's initial trial, prosecutors argued a bite mark on his wrist matched the bite mark of one of the victims. However, DNA testing later showed none of Brown's DNA was in the victim's mouth."

The entire commentary can be found at:
https://www.mrt.com/news/crime/article/Analysis-Book-raises-questions-about-criminal-12705667.php

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. 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 Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy; Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.

Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.

Motherisk Commission: Ontario: Major Development: Commissioner Beaman releases her report, calls for sweeping changes, and knocks, "the reliance in child protection cases on the flawed testing, which was produced at a once-trusted lab at Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children, as manifestly unfair and harmful to the poorest and most vulnerable....Toronto Star Investigative Reporter Rachel Mendleson notes that a former justice, who conducted an independent review, "also lambasted Sick Kids for failing to learn from the lessons of a public inquiry in 2007 and 2008 into the mistakes of disgraced Sick Kids pediatric forensic pathologist Charles Smith, whose flawed autopsy analyses tainted more than a dozen cases. The Smith scandal also involved marginalized parents, flawed forensic evidence and families torn apart."

QUOTE OF THE DAY: "Toronto lawyer Sarah Clarke is representing four parents and one grandparent who have been identified by the commission as having a possible legal remedy. “I can’t imagine what it would be like for the adoptive parents. What do you do? These are your children. The problem is, these are also their parents,” she said, referring to the biological parents she represents, “so it’s really, really tricky.” “People don’t understand … the messiness of Motherisk. It doesn’t just impact the biological parents’ life. It doesn’t just impact the child. It impacts every single person who cares about that child,” Clarke said."

-------------------------------------------

PASSAGE OF THE DAY:  "However, the Motherisk Commission has drawn criticism from some affected parents who say they were excluded from the review process — which they argue should have included public hearings — and has failed to facilitate the reunions that many were hoping for. Heather, an Ontario mother, lost her two young daughters after positive cocaine hair-testing from Motherisk, despite producing dozens of clean urine tests before her 2009 trial. She received a letter from the commission in April 2016 indicating that Motherisk testing played a significant role in the decision to remove her kids, but the adoptive parents have not yet indicated that they are willing to participate in mediation, which the commission is offering to fund as an alternative to a court challenge. “I don’t know where my kids are. I don’t know if they’re safe. I don’t know if they’re happy,” she told the Star/CBC last fall. Heather, not her real name, is among three mothers who launched an unsuccessful application for judicial review of the commission in 2016.) The Provincial Advocate for Children and Youth, Irwin Elman, has said the commission should review every single affected child protection case. Sick Kids has never released comprehensive, cross-country numbers, but Lang’s review found that 16,000 individuals had their hair tested at the request of Ontario child welfare agencies from 2005 to 2015 alone. Roughly 54 per cent of those tests were positive for drugs or alcohol."

 ---------------------------------------------

STORY:  "Motherisk Commission calls for sweeping changes to child protection system," by investigative reporter Rachel Mendleson published by The T0ronto Star on February 26, 2018.

SUB-HEADING: "After identifying 56 cases where families were “broken apart,” Commissioner Judith Beaman’s report makes 32 recommendations to “help ensure that no family suffers a similar injustice in the future.”

PHOTO CAPTION:  "Among the recommendations in Beaman's report: Requiring Children?s Aid Societies to obtain valid written consent ?in every situation where a parent is asked to provide a bodily sample,? and courts to ensure this consent has been given. "

GIST: "Ontario’s Motherisk Commission is calling for significant changes to the province’s child protection system after identifying 56 cases where families were “broken apart” due to ’s flawed hair-strand drug and alcohol testing. In her report released today, Commissioner Judith Beaman described the reliance in child protection cases on the flawed testing, which was produced at a once-trusted lab at Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children, as “manifestly unfair and harmful.” “The testing was imposed on people who were among the poorest and most vulnerable members of our society, with scant regard for due process of their rights to privacy and bodily integrity,” Beaman said in her report released today, entitled Harmful Impacts. “The discovery that unreliable test results were used as expert evidence in child protection proceedings for so many years undermines the public’s confidence in the fairness of our justice system, particularly with respect to how it treats vulnerable people.” As the Star has reported, Motherisk’s discredited hair testing influenced at least eight criminal cases and thousands of child protection cases across the country, beginning in the 1990s. Sick Kids made millions from the hair tests, which were purchased by more than 100 child welfare providers in five provinces, who relied on the results primarily as proof of parental substance abuse. Beaman found that Motherisk’s testing disproportionately impacted Indigenous families, who were involved in nearly 15 per cent of the 1,291 cases the commission reviewed, despite making up less than 3 per cent of Ontario’s population. The commission was established on the recommendation of former Justice Susan Lang, whose independent review of Motherisk concluded in December 2015 that the testing was “inadequate and unreliable” for use in child protection and criminal proceedings. Beaman, also a retired judge, was appointed under the Public Inquiries Act to probe 25 years of child protection cases in Ontario involving Motherisk’s flawed hair tests. Armed with a $10-million budget and a two-year mandate, Beaman was tasked with identifying child protection cases in Ontario in which Motherisk’s tests played a significant role in decisions to remove children from their families, provide counselling and legal assistance and, where possible, facilitate reunification. The commission identified 56 cases where the Motherisk test results had a “substantial impact.”   “Behind every one of the 56 ‘cases,’ families were broken apart and relationships among children, siblings, parents, and extended families and communities were damaged or lost,” she said. Seven of those cases — 12.5 per cent — involved Indigenous families. Beaman’s report outlines 32 recommendations aimed at “addressing systemic issues” that allowed Motherisk’s flawed evidence to taint child protection cases for so long — recommendations she said are intended to “help ensure that no family suffers a similar injustice in the future.” They include:

• Requiring Children’s Aid Societies to obtain valid written consent “in every situation where a parent is asked to provide a bodily sample,” and courts to ensure this consent has been given.

• Requiring that scientific test results used in child protection proceedings be accompanied by a report from an expert explaining the meaning of the result and the underlying science.

• Expanding the availability of legal aid funding in child protection cases involving expert evidence, and providing funding for social workers to assist parents’ lawyers.

• Developing more substance use treatment programs that are “family-inclusive,” and ongoing education for child protection workers about “substance use issues and their impact on parenting.”

• Continuing legal education for lawyers on child welfare and at least one course on child welfare in law schools.

• Funding from the federal government for First Nations Band representatives to participate in child protection proceedings.   In a statement on Monday, Attorney General Yasir Naqvi vowed to take action on several of Beaman’s recommendations, including continuing to offer counselling services for families affected by Motherisk, establishing a task force of outside experts to guide next steps as asking the judiciary, the Law Society of Ontario and Legal Aid to act.

The exercise is further complicated by the fact that Motherisk’s testing was deemed unreliable but not necessarily inaccurate, and since the lab did not retain samples for future testing, there is no way to fully exonerate affected parents. Furthermore, once finalized, adoptions are virtually impossible to overturn, because the courts place tremendous weight on the best interests of the child. “This means that even where the discredited Motherisk testing substantially affected the outcome of cases, the families will likely have difficulty brining about a change in the children’s situations,” Beaman said. “These cases are likely to be very difficult and stressful to litigate and challenging for the courts to consider.” Of the 56 cases, Beaman said seven families have “achieved a legal remedy.” In four of those cases, “children have been returned to their parents’ care.” Toronto lawyer Sarah Clarke is representing four parents and one grandparent who have been identified by the commission as having a possible legal remedy. “I can’t imagine what it would be like for the adoptive parents. What do you do? These are your children. The problem is, these are also their parents,” she said, referring to the biological parents she represents, “so it’s really, really tricky.” “People don’t understand … the messiness of Motherisk. It doesn’t just impact the biological parents’ life. It doesn’t just impact the child. It impacts every single person who cares about that child,” Clarke said. Governments in New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and British Columbia have also launched reviews of affected child protection cases, but so far Ontario is the only province to establish an independent process and provide a framework for counselling and legal support. However, the Motherisk Commission has drawn criticism from some affected parents who say they were excluded from the review process — which they argue should have included public hearings — and has failed to facilitate the reunions that many were hoping for. Heather, an Ontario mother, lost her two young daughters after positive cocaine hair-testing from Motherisk, despite producing dozens of clean urine tests before her 2009 trial. She received a letter from the commission in April 2016 indicating that Motherisk testing played a significant role in the decision to remove her kids, but the adoptive parents have not yet indicated that they are willing to participate in mediation, which the commission is offering to fund as an alternative to a court challenge. “I don’t know where my kids are. I don’t know if they’re safe. I don’t know if they’re happy,” she told the Star/CBC last fall. Heather, not her real name, is among three mothers who launched an unsuccessful application for judicial review of the commission in 2016.) The Provincial Advocate for Children and Youth, Irwin Elman, has said the commission should review every single affected child protection case. Sick Kids has never released comprehensive, cross-country numbers, but Lang’s review found that 16,000 individuals had their hair tested at the request of Ontario child welfare agencies from 2005 to 2015 alone. Roughly 54 per cent of those tests were positive for drugs or alcohol. In her report, Beaman said the commission “made every effort to identify and review all of the cases involving Motherisk testing where children were permanently removed from their families and were still under the age of 18.” The commission also drew fire for an outreach campaign last March that tried to use schools to find children affected by the Motherisk scandal. A flyer posted on elementary and high school bulletin boards and Facebook pages asked students: “Were you taken from your parent by the Children’s Aid Society?” Outrage from Elman, as well as adoptive parents and students, led the Ministry of Education, which had sanctioned the campaign, to promptly pull the plug on the effort. At the time, the commission said the flyers were not intended to be posted in elementary schools, but defended the campaign, which was created in consultation with “a variety of groups representing children and youth.” The Motherisk scandal began in late 2014, when criticism of the reliability of the lab’s hair-testing results in a 2009 criminal case, involving a Toronto mother who was sent to jail for feeding her toddler cocaine, prompted the Court of Appeal to overturn her drug-related convictions. After a series of stories in the Star revealed that Motherisk had not used a gold-standard test to verify its results from 2005 to 2010, contrary to international forensic standards, Queen’s Park appointed Lang to review the reliability of five years of testing. For months, Sick Kids vigorously defended Motherisk. Hospital executives said they had “full confidence in the reliability of Motherisk’s hair testing” and continued to allow the lab to test samples for child welfare agencies. But during Lang’s review, in March 2015, Sick Kids suspended hair-testing at Motherisk, after learning it had been misled about external proficiency testing it had previously cited as proof that the lab’s results could be trusted. The lab was closed for good the next month. Lang’s mandate was expanded in April 2015, doubling the period under scrutiny to cover 2005 to 2015. Her blistering report on Motherisk chronicled a litany of failings at the once-revered lab. She said the use of Motherisk’s “hair-testing evidence in child protection and criminal cases has serious implications for the fairness of those proceedings and warrants an additional review.” Lang also lambasted Sick Kids for failing to learn from the lessons of a public inquiry in 2007 and 2008 into the mistakes of disgraced Sick Kids pediatric forensic pathologist Charles Smith, whose flawed autopsy analyses tainted more than a dozen cases. The Smith scandal also involved marginalized parents, flawed forensic evidence and families torn apart. In an interview with the Star/CBC last fall, Lang called the fallout from Motherisk “a tragedy.” Sick Kids issued a public apology for the Motherisk scandal in October 2015. The hospital, along with Motherisk founder and former director Dr. Gideon Koren and lab manager Joey Gareri, have been named as defendants in a series of lawsuits involving at least 328 plaintiffs. A proposed class-action, which sought compensation for 10,000 people across Canada, was rejected by a Toronto judge last fall, but the plaintiff is appealing that decision. Koren retired from Sick Kids during the scandal in June 2015. He is currently working for a health-care company in Israel and still speaks at medical conferences around the world. Although it no longer includes a hair-testing lab, the Motherisk Program, which Koren created at Sick Kids in 1985 to provide drug-safety advice to pregnant and lactating women, is still operational."

The entire story can be found at:

https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2018/02/26/motherisk-tests-unfair-and-harmful-to-families-in-child-protection-cases.html

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. 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 Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy; Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog."