Ont. woman convicted on disgraced pathologist's testimony granted bail
'I would never wish this upon my worst enemy,' freed mother says
A Toronto woman released on bail Thursday pending a review of her 1995 murder conviction, which was based on evidence presented by a disgraced former child pathologist, says she has been through a "living hell."
Tammy Marquardt speaks to reporters following the Ontario Court of Appeals decision granting her release on Thursday in Toronto. (CBC)
Supporters of Tammy Marquardt erupted in cheers in a Toronto courtroom on Thursday morning as Ontario Appeal Court justice Kathryn Feldman read the order releasing her to a halfway house until her appeal is heard.
Marquardt, who was convicted of suffocating her 2½-year-old son Kenneth, is one of several individuals in Ontario whose cases have been reopened in the wake of an expert panel of pathologists and a public inquiry discrediting the testimony of Dr. Charles Smith.
Speaking to reporters outside the courthouse, a tearful Marquardt said the court's decision was the "first step" in clearing her name after 14 years behind bars.
"Today, I finally have my day," she said. "I would never wish this upon my worst enemy."
Marquardt has steadfastly denied killing her son, who was found tangled up in his bed sheets on Oct 9, 1993. During Marquardt's trial, Smith testified that tiny red marks on the toddler's lungs were proof he had been asphyxiated.
But six other forensic experts concluded Smith was wrong. They said the boy had epilepsy, which meant he could have died from a seizure or other natural causes.
James Lockyer, a lawyer for the group who is representing Marquardt, told CBC News there is "every reason" to think his client is innocent and said he would present evidence to prove it.
As for Smith, Marquardt said she doesn't think the former pathologist has fully answered for his actions.
"All I want to say to him is, 'Why?' " she told reporters.
Smith made 'false and misleading statements': inquiry
Dr. Charles Smith waits to deliver testimony at the Goudge inquiry in Toronto on Jan. 28, 2008. (Adrian Wyld/Canadian Press)
In 20 child autopsies reviewed by outside experts in 2005, Smith was found to have made major scientific errors, leading to baseless charges of child-killing and 13 subsequent criminal convictions.
Marquardt, who was only 23 years old and pregnant when she went to prison, is the only one involved in that review who is still behind bars. She has been serving her sentence at the Grand Valley Institution in Kitchener, Ont.
Her baby and another son, both born after she was charged, were seized by the Children's Aid Society and later adopted.
Lockyer noted she has been behind bars longer than William Mullins-Johnson, who spent 12 years in prison after Smith wrongly accused him of murdering his four-year-old niece in 1993.
Mullins-Johnson, who was acquitted by the Ontario Court of Appeal in 2007, came to the courthouse to show his support for his friend Marquardt.
"We connected immediately," he said. "The length of time that we were sentenced to, the damage to our families, to ourselves. We paralleled each other in a lot of ways."
The two walked away from the courthouse hand-in-hand.
At the provincial inquiry examining Smith's mistakes, the former pathologist apologized to the people who suffered because of his errors.
In his final report, Justice Stephen Goudge found that over a 10-year span at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, Smith "actively misled" his superiors, "made false and misleading statements" in court and exaggerated his expertise in trials.
Ont. woman convicted on disgraced pathologist's testimony granted bail
Why is this all taking so long? They've known this guy was a piece of shit for years. They started reviewing his cases back in 2005. He testified that a girl had been stabbed to death by her parents and it later turned out that she had been mauled by a pit bull.
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The Suspicious Cases Of Dr. Charles Smith
Thursday March 12, 2009
CityNews.ca Staff
Tammy Marquardt isn't the only person convicted of committing a murder that has led to a questionable outcome. There have been a large number of other cases that Dr. Charles Smith has worked on that have since come under a very different microscope.
William Mullins-Johnson may be the best known 'victim' of the testimony of the disgraced pathologist, but he's not the only one. Here's a look at some of the other people he implicated through some questionable findings that eventually prompted him to
apologize at an inquiry in November 2007
1993
William Mullins-Johnson (pictured)
One of the first cases tied to Smith's work and the most notorious. Mullins-Johnson's four-year-old niece is discovered dead early one morning by grief stricken relatives in her Sault Ste Marie home. Forensic evidence assembled by Smith appeared to show she'd been physically assaulted and strangled and the Crown used it to point the finger at her uncle.
They managed to secure a first-degree murder conviction and Mullins-Johnson was sent to jail for a dozen years, all the while pleading his innocence. His was finally released in 2005 on appeal after concerns were raised about the pathologist's evidence.
The convicted killer finally had his day before the Ontario Court of Appeals on October 15th, 2007,
giving gut-wrenching testimony about that terrible morning so many years ago.
"I was sleeping on the couch," he recalled, frequently breaking down in tears. "And the next thing I hear was Kim barreling down the stairs. She was crying, screaming. She, uh-- she woke me up out of my sleeping with all that noise. And I asked her what was wrong. Then she told me that Valin was dead. I couldn't believe my ears, and I yelled back to her, 'What?!' And she screamed back at me, 'Valin's dead!'"
When the Crown stood up and agreed there was a miscarriage of justice in the case, his vindication was assured. "An acquittal is really required in this case," Crown prosecutor Ken Campbell told the three-judge panel, adding that six world-renowned experts found "no evidence of homicide and no evidence of sexual injury" to suggest Valin was sodomized and strangled.
Mullins-Johnson walked out of court a free man. Evidence presented showed the doctor had lost tissue samples that could have proven the child died of natural causes.
The now cleared suspect has since launched a $13 million lawsuit against the man whose testimony lead to his long incarceration.
Marco and Anisa Trotta
Marco Trotta of Oshawa is found guilty of physically abusing and ultimately killing his eight-month-old son. An initial assessment indicates the baby died of SIDS, but evidence presented by Dr. Smith seems to indicate otherwise.
Marco is convicted and spends nine years in jail, before being released in May 2007 on appeal. Anisa is convicted of criminal negligence causing death and serves a five-year term.
But when the case
went back to court in November 2007, a judge ruled that Smith's track record couldn't be trusted and ordered a new trial for the husband, who has always professed his innocence.
1995
Lianne Gagnon
An 11-month-old Sudbury child crawls under a table and bumps his head. The injuries prove fatal. Two years later, his 22-year-old mother Lianne is questioned and accused of murdering her youngster, even as she denies the accusation.
The child's body is exhumed and examined by Smith, who believed the boy was murdered. But after two long years under a cloud of suspicion, other experts take a second look at the case and decide there's no evidence of any foul play.
1996
Sherry Sherrett
When her 4-month-old son died suddenly in Trenton, Ontario, Smith's autopsy showed Sherry Sherrett's son suffered a skull fracture and neck trauma, leading to first degree murder charges, and one year in jail for the devastated mom.
A probe by the
Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted helped to get the body exhumed and re-examined by other pathologists, who found the child choked to death after accidentally getting caught in his bedding.
"I woke up to my son gone. He was taken from me. And from that day on, I became a baby killer. It haunts me still to this day,"
Sherrett recalled. "People had labelled me as a baby killer, and when you hear this for so long you begin to doubt yourself. Only Joshua knows at this point that I never harmed him."
As a result of her arrest and imprisonment, her older son was taken away from her and adopted.
Now Sherry and her supporters want her exonerated, and are demanding the government step in and expedite the process.
1997
Louise Reynolds
The Kingston mother spent more than two years in jail facing a murder charge, after Smith found that her seven-year-old daughter was stabbed to death with a pair of scissors. After a review, new evidence showed the girl could have been attacked by a pit bull. The charges were dropped.
Brenda Waudby
Smith claims Waudby's 21-month-old died from blunt force trauma while she was home alone with her mother at their Peterborough residence. A single pubic hair is found on the body.
Months later, her mother is charged with second-degree murder. But two years later, in 1999, conflicting medical evidence suggests it didn't happen that way and the charges are dropped.
Smith denied knowing anything about the hair, but in 2001, it's discovered in his desk drawer and turned over to police. Still, the case remained unsolved.
Then in 2005 comes the break investigators have been waiting almost a decade for. An undercover operation leads to a confession from the child's former babysitter. A boy admits he hit the little girl repeatedly, punching her at least six times in the stomach.
His confession claims he was simply angry over having to look after the child. In December 2006, he pled guilty to manslaughter.
Anthony Kporwodu and Angela Veno
The Toronto couple is charged with murdering their baby. But Smith takes so long with the autopsy report - more than seven months - that a judge is forced to throw out the case because it violated the right to a timely trial for the pair.
1998
Maureen Laidely
A three-year-old Toronto boy dies under peculiar circumstances and Smith finds reason to believe foul play was involved. His father's girlfriend, Maureen Laidely, is subsequently charged with murder. But just as her trial is set to begin, the Crown withdraws the accusation. The reason?
A trio of other pathologists rule that the child was most likely killed after he accidentally fell off a coffee table.
CityNews.ca - Toronto's News: The Suspicious Cases Of Dr. Charles Smith
Pathologist lied. Woman spent 14 years in jail, lost custody of kids.
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