PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "After Innocence Canada contacted Toronto police about Rees’s case, members of the service’s homicide cold case squad uncovered the tape of the interview with Raymer, which was conducted at 22 Division on March 17, 1989, the day after Darla’s murder. The interview, conducted by now-retired Toronto police Const. George Clanfield, contains shocking admissions and incriminating statements from a man described in court documents as having physical and intellectual disabilities. Over roughly 40 pages of the interview’s transcript, Raymer — who died in 1999 — admits that he had sexually “played” with the little girl in the past and that, on the night she was killed, he went into her room to “kiss her goodnight.” “I think a long time ago, I fell in love with her,” Raymer says at one point in the interview, explaining how he and the 10-year-old girl would often “have fun” late into the night. In a long exchange, Clanfield presses Raymer to explain what exactly that means. “About a month ago you and her played together. Did she make you hard?” Clanfield asks. “Oh yeah,” Raymer responds. “You touched Darla and got her excited and, and you got all excited and everything. Right?” “Yeah.” At the end of the interview, Clanfied pushes harder still about the night of Darla’s murder; by now, Raymer has changed his story. “I told you I didn’t see her,” he says. “That’s a lie,” the officer responds. Raymer later testified at Rees’s trial and denied any involvement in the murder; none of his statements to police were disclosed to the defence. In court earlier this week, Clanfield said he didn’t recall meeting Raymer, nor the tape, which he described as “a complete revelation to me.”
--------------------------------------------------------------
STORY: "Did Toronto police ‘bury’ evidence of this girl’s real killer? Shocking tape of admitted abuser never turned over to Crown, defence," by Court Reporter Betsy Powell, published by The Toronto Star, on July 2, 2024. (Betsy Powell is a reporter with the crime, courts and justice team at the Star. She is the author of Bad Seeds: the True Story of Toronto's Galloway Boys Street Gang.")
SUB-HEADING: "Timothy Rees, 61, spent 19 years in prison for the 1989 murder of 10-year-old Darla Thurrott. It was only later, with the help of the Innocence Project, that he learned Toronto police had never turned over a startlingly incriminating interview with another man.
PHOTO CAPTION: "10-year-old Darla Thurrott was found strangled in her Etobicoke bedroom on March 17, 1989."
PHOTTO CAPTION: "Timothy Rees arrives at the Ontario Court of Appeal at Osgoode Hall in Toronto on Thursday. Rees spent 19 years in prison and continues to serve a life sentence."
GIST: "Did Toronto police investigators “bury” a shocking tape recording of a man admitting sexual encounters with a 10-year-old murder victim in order to convict a man who went on to serve nearly two decades in prison for a crime he insists he did not commit?
That’s the allegation at the heart of an unusual court proceeding initiated by Timothy Rees, 61, who claims he was wrongfully convicted of second-degree murder in the strangulation death of Darla Thurrott, found lifeless in her bed on March 17, 1989.
A tape-recorded police interview with James Raymer — a 53-year-old man who slept in a room across from Darla’s bedroom — was so incriminating, Rees should never been charged with her murder, let alone convicted, Rees’s lawyer James Lockyer argued this week while grilling several former Toronto police officers over their investigation.
Rees long ago exhausted all avenues of appeal, and so he turned to Innocence Canada while serving his life sentence. It was only when a lawyer with the non-profit advocacy group requested full disclosure of the case, that they received an audio cassette tape of an interview conducted between a Toronto police constable and Raymer, the owner of the Etobicoke house where Darla lived with her parents.
The recording was never disclosed to Rees’s defence lawyer in 1990.
After reviewing this “fresh evidence,” federal justice officials last year sent the case back to the Ontario Court of Appeal for a rare criminal conviction review hearing, saying there was “reasonable basis to believe that a miscarriage of justice likely occurred.”
If the panel of three judges agrees, Rees’s case will join the list of Canada’s highest-profile wrongful convictions, alongside those of names like Steven Truscott, Guy Paul Morin, Donald Marshall and David Milgaard.
On Friday, Lockyer challenged the retired Toronto police homicide detective in charge of the Thurrott case, who denied concealing the taped interview with Raymer — who was, the lawyer noted, the son of a senior Ontario Provincial Police officer.
“When you charged Tim Rees, you decided then and there to bury negative information about James Raymer,” Lockyer suggested to Wayne Cotgreave, who retired in 2005.
“Absolutely not, there was no reason to,” Cotgreave replied, saying he first heard the incriminating recording in 2011, long after Rees was already convicted.
Any suggestion that Cotgreave and his partner Doug Massey, who died last year, were “trying to get Raymer off the hook, is just, to me despicable,” the 73-year-old former detective said.
Lockyer continued: “You didn’t tell ... (the prosecutor) that Raymer admitted sexual relations with Darla, he admitted kissing her goodnight, he admitted meeting ... her in the washroom in the middle of the night.”
“Those details are on the tape,” Cotgreave replied. “I did not see the tape.”
The murder of Darla Thurrott
Immediately after the murder, and lacking any signs of forced entry, police concentrated their investigation on the occupants: Darla’s mother, her boyfriend, a basement tenant, Raymer, and Rees, a family friend who had stayed overnight following a night of partying at the residence.
At the time, Rees was 26. He had a criminal record and a history of drug and alcohol abuse. Eventually, after two months and multiple police interviews, Rees told police he choked Darla to death, saying he did so to “send her on to a more perfect life.” (At trial, the jury heard Darla had a learning disability and was teased at school.)
But Rees later recanted, and at his trial in 1990, his defence lawyer claimed he’d been “pressured” into making a false confession after he had gone without food or sleep for days amid a booze and drug binge.
Nonetheless, the jury convicted Rees of second-degree murder and handed him a life sentence.
According to the Star’s archives, Rees — who is currently on parole and was in court to watch the hearings this week — “swore and spat at” Cotgreave after the jury’s verdict was announced.
“The handcuffed Rees, 27, had to be physically restrained by court security as he struggled in the prisoner’s box,” the Star reported at the time.
Rees would spend the next 19 years in federal prison before he was paroled in 2016.
It was only then, long after Rees had exhausted all regular avenues to appeal, that he turned to Innocence Canada, a non-profit organization with a mandate to identify, advocate for and exonerate individuals convicted of crimes they did not commit.
The unseen evidence against James Raymer
Over the years, Innocence Canada has successfully overturned several wrongful convictions over issues including faulty eyewitness identification, false confessions, police and prosecutorial tunnel vision, systemic discrimination, errors and advances in forensic science, and professional misconduct — which can include the withholding of evidence from the defence.
The latter is at the heart of the Rees case.
After Innocence Canada contacted Toronto police about Rees’s case, members of the service’s homicide cold case squad uncovered the tape of the interview with Raymer, which was conducted at 22 Division on Mach 17, 1989, the day after Darla’s murder.
The interview, conducted by now-retired Toronto police Const. George Clanfield, contains shocking admissions and incriminating statements from a man described in court documents as having physical and intellectual disabilities.
Over roughly 40 pages of the interview’s transcript, Raymer — who died in 1999 — admits that he had sexually “played” with the little girl in the past and that, on the night she was killed, he went into her room to “kiss her goodnight.”
“I think a long time ago, I fell in love with her,” Raymer says at one point in the interview, explaining how he and the 10-year-old girl would often “have fun” late into the night.
In a long exchange, Clanfield presses Raymer to explain what exactly that means.
“About a month ago you and her played together. Did she make you hard?” Clanfield asks.
“Oh yeah,” Raymer responds.
“You touched Darla and got her excited and, and you got all excited and everything. Right?”
“Yeah.”
At the end of the interview, Clanfied pushes harder still about the night of Darla’s murder; by now, Raymer has changed his story.
“I told you I didn’t see her,” he says.
“That’s a lie,” the officer responds.
Raymer later testified at Rees’s trial and denied any involvement in the murder; none of his statements to police were disclosed to the defence.
In court earlier this week, Clanfield said he didn’t recall meeting Raymer, nor the tape, which he described as “a complete revelation to me.”
Lockyer asked Clanfield if he shared the contents with the two homicide investigators on the case, Cotgreave and Massey.
“One hundred per cent, I cannot see why I would not,” Clanfield replied.
Why was the tape never heard?
In court this week, Lockyer has repeatedly challenged police witnesses on why the tape never saw the light of day.
On Thursday, Lockyer asked Clanfield if he remembered that Raymer came from a family with a lot of money and that his father was a superintendent with the OPP.
Yes, Clanfield said, saying he recalled Raymer’s dad was “high up,” in the OPP.
The disclosure of the prosecution’s evidence against an accused person — including exculpatory evidence — is a core pillar of the Canadian justice system.
In 1991, that principle was enshrined in the landmark Supreme Court decision R. v. Stinchcombe, which states the Crown has a legal duty to disclose all relevant information to the defence, “to be used to ensure that justice is done.”
For his part, Cotgreave noted the Thurrott murder predated that decision. In a sworn affidavit, he wrote: “As I recall, disclosure rules 35 rules ago — pre-Stinchcombe — were very different. Police were not required to give full disclosure of their investigations.”
On Friday, he explained that the first time he heard the recording was last month after it was sent to him as part of the current proceeding. The cassette was found in a banker’s box at police headquarters with his name on it.
However, Cotgreave added, even if he was aware of what was on the recording, he’s not certain he would have advised the prosecution, saying it may not have been relevant.
How could a man’s admission to sexually molesting the victim not be relevant to a murder prosecution, Lockyer pressed.
“To me, sexual assault doesn’t equal a killer,” Cotgreave replied.
Cotgreave retired from the Toronto Police Service in 2005 after a 35-year career over which he rose up the ranks from constable to superintendent, eventually working in the office of then-Chief of Police Julian Fantino.
According to a document filed with court, Crown prosecutors have conceded that the tape should have been handed over to prosecutors by police, even 35 years ago before the Stinchcombe ruling.
Associate Chief Justice Michal Fairburn, and Justices Gary Trotter and Benjamin Zarnett are conducting the review, which will resume this fall."
The entire story can be read at:
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue/resource. 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.
SEE BREAKDOWN OF SOME OF THE ON-GOING INTERNATIONAL CASES (OUTSIDE OF THE CONTINENTAL USA) THAT I AM FOLLOWING ON THIS BLOG, AT THE LINK BELOW: HL:
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/120008354894645705/4704913685758792985
———————————————————————————————
FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices."
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
—————————————————————————————————
FINAL, FINAL WORD: "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions. They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they've exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
--------------------------------------------------------------------
