The Ontario government will not call a public inquiry into Robert Baltovich's wrongful conviction in the 1990 murder of Elizabeth Bain.
Attorney General Chris Bentley said Friday that he has decided not to call an inquiry into the Baltovich matter, and will instead focus on improving the justice system so that other cases do not remain unsolved after 18 years.
"I've concluded that another inquiry into this case will not provide additional information to strengthen the administration of justice beyond what we are doing," Mr. Bentley said in an interview.
The Attorney General's decision was widely assailed by opposition members at the Ontario legislature and by Mr. Baltovich's lawyer, all of whom said the justice system cannot be improved without examining what went wrong in this case.
"I'm extremely disappointed," said James Lockyer, Mr. Baltovich's lawyer. "Obviously, things went awfully wrong for 18 years. An innocent man was prosecuted. The police made a complete mess of the case. The Crown's office made a complete mess of the case."
In deciding not to call an inquiry, Mr. Bentley has resisted an enormous amount of pressure from Mr. Lockyer, opposition members and even Premier Dalton McGuinty. Last month, when Mr. Baltovich's second trial on a second-degree murder charge for the disappearance of his girlfriend collapsed, Mr. McGuinty said he was open to calling an inquiry.
"It's a troubling story," Mr. McGuinty said at the time. "Reacting as a human being, you ask yourself how things could have gone wrong and how do we make sure it doesn't happen again."
Mr. Bentley did not share that view. "My first instinct is that this case followed the process," he said at the time. "It is not the type of case that would merit or warrant an inquiry."
Mr. Bentley has not changed his mind even after meeting this week with the parent of Elizabeth Bain and with Mr. Lockyer. He said he does not need to go back over the Baltovich case to make improvements to the system.
"Cases like this should not take 18 years," he said. "We will improve the system so that justice moves faster. We will do whatever it takes to make that happen."
New Democrat MPP Peter Kormos said it is impossible to prevent other similar miscarriages of justice without doing a thorough analysis of the Baltovich case.
"The failure of the Attorney General to respond responsibly and to call an inquiry compounds the injustice because it ignores the fact that Baltovich is a victim of a system that failed miserably," Mr. Kormos told reporters.
Mr. Baltovich, 42, spent nine years behind bars for a crime that he did not commit. He was sentenced in 1992 to life in prison after being found guilty of killing Ms. Bain, a University of Toronto student whose body has never been found.
Ontario's highest court quashed his conviction in 2005 and ordered a new trial. Last month, he was found not guilty after the Crown dropped its prosecution just minutes after his second trial began.
Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory said today that Mr. Bentley needed to call an inquiry to restore confidence in the justice system.
"He doesn't seem to get the fact that it's about confidence in the justice system," Mr. Tory told reporters. "People aren't just worried about the time it takes. They're worried about the results."
Karen Howlett