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On Wednesday October 1st, Mr. Justice Stephen Goudge released his report in the Public Inquiry into Pediatric Forensic Pathology in Ontario. The public inquiry examined the work of former Toronto pathologist Dr. Charles Smith in connection with the death of some 20 children.

The report is a stinging indictment of both Dr. Smith, who bungled autopsies, misdiagnosed causes of death, overstated his expertise and jumped to conclusions about family members based on their socio-economic status, and his superiors, who failed to recognize that he was incompetent and ignored warnings about his work for more than a decade.  One of Justice Goudge's 169 recommendations is that the province set up a system to compensate Smith's victims, some of whom went to jail for murders that never happened.

The Star quotes SGM's Frank Addario, who had this to say about the report:

“He (Goudge) identified a complete failure of oversight on the part of the Ontario coroner’s office ... We see this as step one.”

“Step two is the government’s response. They need to step up to the plate as quickly as possible and build some confidence back into the system."

Exactly ten years ago, the public learned, during the inquiry into the Guy Paul Morin’s wrongful 1992 murder conviction, that “the forensic science system in Ontario has flaws,” Addario noted. “We’ve learned it again during this inquiry.”

In addition to insisting on standards of excellence generally through the system, Addario suggested it may also be time to insist that judges be required to undertake some training in basic sciences and scientific principles if they’re going to preside at homicide trials.

SGM's Louis Sokolov represented the Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted at the inquiry.

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