Law Times - Newsmakers

Dec 2008 Newsmakers

The premier weekly newspaper for the legal profession in Ontario

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news continued from page 10 had signified their commitment to advancement in four core areas: tracking gender demographics, flexible working arrangements, net- working and business development, and mentoring and leadership skills development for women. The report included several other recommendations aimed at priori- tizing the retention of women. Kirby Chown, Ontario managing partner of McCarthy Tétrault LLP, spoke highly of the report in an interview with Law Times. "Having read many studies on the problems relating to the retention of women that have been undertaken by private bodies or bar associations in Canada and the United States, I really see this report as being thorough and comprehensive, and coming up with some very interesting and innovative proposals for dealing with the issue," said Chown. Of course, the recommendations went beyond the medium- and small- sized firms. Another proposal resulted in the introduction of a three-year pilot program for parental leave ben- efits, set to begin 2009. It aims to help out those in firms of five people or less with no parental financial benefit programs by offering $3,000 a month for up to three months. The parental leave benefits repre- sented the largest costs among the recommendations; the report esti- mated it at about $500,000 per year in the first year, assuming 60 lawyers will take advantage of the program. When the cost is spread across the LSUC, it works out to an additional $15 per member. Factoring in the turnover cost for a four-year associate — the report puts it at $315,000 — helps to put some of those figures in perspective. At a panel discussion on women and law, one participant noted the importance of the initiatives intro- duced this year, saying they have potential implications in many areas, including recruitment of arti- cling students. She said students are becoming savvier on the topic and asking pointed questions about diversity within the firm, so choosing to participate with projects such as the Justicia Think Tank could even lend a hand in attracting the best and brightest law school graduates. 14 December 2008 Baltovich cleared after 16 years BY GLENN KAUTH A fter 16 years as a convicted murderer, it was in 2008 that Robert Baltovich got the acquittal he sought for so long. Back in 1992, the courts found him guilty of killing his girlfriend Elizabeth Bain following her disappearance in 1990. Three days after she went missing, her car turned up at a mechanic shop in Scarborough with her bloodstains in it. Police alleged Baltovich, then 24, was the jealous boyfriend who murdered her. He received a life sentence for the crime. But Baltovich claimed he was wrongfully convicted, with his lawyers hinting that Paul Bernardo, the Scarborough rapist, was the real culprit. Bernardo maintains his innocence, but this year Bain's case was left unsolved after a jury acquitted Baltovich. In 2004, the Ontario Court of Appeal had overturned his original convic- tion after deciding the evidence against him was circumstantial. The Crown then moved to hold another trial, but on April 22, just as the case was about to begin again, a prosecutor announced it would be calling no evidence against Baltovich. Within minutes, the jury found him not guilty. The case was a victory for the Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted, which led Baltovich's long journey through the courts. The April ruling came just months before another famous case handled by AIDWYC, that of Steven Truscott, resulted in a major compensation award to someone who also battled for years against his conviction. In July, the Ontario gov- ernment announced it would pay Truscott $6.5 million in recognition for his 48-year ordeal to prove his innocence. The move followed a 2007 Court of Appeal ruling that acquitted him of killing 12-year-old Lynne Harper in 1959. He was just 14 when the courts originally found him guilty and sentenced him to death. The two cases had high profiles, and both once again raised questions about the justice system's record of wrongfully convicting people as well as its ability to handle claims of mis- carriages of justice. For Heather McArthur, one of the lawyers who defended Baltovich, the process showed that too often the system approaches such cases with an assumption of guilt. "Once you have a rush to judgment and a focus on a particular individual, where every action and every movement is being evaluated through the prism of guilt, it becomes a very Robert Baltovich, who in 1992 was convicted of murdering his girlfriend Elizabeth Bain, was this year acquitted of the crime. dangerous situation," she told Law Times after her client's acquittal. "Because no matter what action is taken and no matter what happens, it's evaluated through a prism of guilt. And if evidence comes forward that shows a certain assumption is wrong, instead of stepping back and evaluating it, then things just shift." But despite those concerns, William Trudell, chairman of the Canadian Council of Crimi- nal Defence Lawyers, told Law Times the fact Baltovich got his acquittal gave him confidence in the justice system. "In many countries who aren't prepared to look at mistakes and correct them, that wouldn't happen. In terms of the system creaking along to the right result, I give it high marks." Nevertheless, Trudell argued the acquittal highlighted the need for Crown prosecutors to become involved in cases earlier in the police investigation to test the evidence against the accused. In the meantime, the battle isn't over yet for Baltovich, who is requesting compensation from the government for his ordeal. Baltovich's case wasn't, however, the only high-profile case where Bernardo's name played a role in changing outcomes this year. In July, the Court of Appeal overturned the 1989 conviction of Anthony Hanemaayer for a knife attack on a 15-year-old girl in Scarborough two years earlier. He served a two-year sentence after pleading guilty — something he said he did on the advice of his lawyer — but changed his plea after discovering evidence that Bernardo had in fact confessed to the crime to police in 2006. The Crown had originally relied on testi- mony from the victim's mother identifying Hanemaayer as the culprit in order to convict him. It was again with the help of AIDWYC that Hanemaayer was able to launch the appeal, which brought his case to a quick end after the Crown announced, as with Baltovich, it wouldn't be proceeding with any evidence against him. Photo: Toronto Star

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