TORONTO – Steven Truscott, who spent 10 years in jail after being wrongfully convicted of murder and sentenced to hang, said a $6.5 million compensation payment from the Ontario government was “bittersweet” but would help bring a “degree of closure” to the decades-long journey to clear his name.
Truscott and his wife Marlene described the settlement as a “long awaited step” in recognizing his innocence. In receiving the payment Truscott joins a small group of other wrongfully convicted men who have been awarded compensation following a miscarriage of justice.
“Although we are grateful for the freedom and stability this award will provide, we are also painfully aware that no amount of money could ever truly compensate Steven for the terror of being sentenced to hang at the age of 14, the loss of his youth, or the stigma of living for almost 50 years as a convicted murderer,” Truscott and his wife said in a statement.
She was given $100,000 for income she lost while working to clear her husband’s name.
There is no legal entitlement in Canada to compensation for a wrongful conviction unless there is a civil action or a voluntary payment by government.
Truscott’s compensation was recommended in a report by retired Ontario Appeal Court Justice Sydney Robins, who was asked to advise the province on the case after the Ontario Court of Appeal, last August, directed Truscott be acquitted of the 1959 rape and killing of 12-year-old Lynne Harper.
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Truscott, now 63, was 14 when he was sentenced to hang after the little girl’s body was found in a wooded grove near an air force base in Clinton, Ont. His sentence was commuted to life and he was released on parole in 1969.
In his 57-page report, Robins said he used other cases of wrongfully convicted men as a guide for compensation but said he was working with only two cases where there was an explanation given for a compensation figure.
Thomas Sophonow received $2.5 million after spending four years in prison on charges of strangling a teenager. He was exonerated in 2000 with the use of DNA evidence.
Donald Marshall spent 11 years in jail after being convicted at age 17 of murder in Nova Scotia and received a settlement of $1.5 million.
In his report, Robins noted there were also others wrongfully convicted but David Milgaard, who spent 23 years in prison before being exonerated by DNA evidence, was the “high-water mark” for compensation.
Milgaard was awarded $10 million after spending 23 years behind bars for the 1969 death of nursing aide Gail Miller.
According to the report, Truscott’s attorneys wanted “significantly in excess of the amount paid to Mr. Milgaard,” and suggested his case was more comparable to Milgaard or to the case of Maher Arar.
Arar was awarded $10.5 million in compensation and an apology from the federal government in 2006 after he was deported to Syria by U.S authorities.
But Robins said there was “no justification” in Truscott’s case for such an award, noting Arar’s payment did not stem from a wrongful conviction but a settlement of a lawsuit resulting “from governmental kidnapping to Syria, detention under the most inhumane conditions, and torture.”
Marlys Edwardh, a lawyer for Truscott said compensation payments are difficult to compare and suggested there should be a tribunal established that looks at miscarriages of justice to decide how to compensate victims.
“The frequency with which we are identifying cases that raise this issue is sufficiently alarming that we need to have both a coherent strategy and understanding around the things that go wrong as well as a proper basis for compensation when there is a miscarriage of justice,” Edwardh said.
Robins, said any attempt to put a dollar figure on the suffering endured by Truscott would be “quixotic, at best.”
He acknowledged Truscott lived most of his adolescence in custody and in jail was given LSD by psychiatrists in order to solicit a confession. After his release, his conviction remained an “enormous” presence in his life and he often moved his family out of fear of neighbours would discover his true identity.
Still, Robins said over the next 37 years Truscott managed to build a “remarkably stable and successful life” for his family in southwestern Ontario where he recently retired after working as a mechanical millwright.
The report recommends compensation costs be shared by both the province and the federal government, though Ontario Attorney General Chris Bentley said details about the federal contributions have not been worked out.
With files from Linda Nguyen
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