Obstruction of Justice by Police and Crown

The Honourable Ernie Eves, Premier of Ontario

Room 281, Main Legislative Building

Toronto, Ontario

M7A 1A1

Dear Premier Eves:

Re: Obstruction of Justice by police and the Crown Attorney’s Office relating to domestic violence

Last week, after 16 months of criminal charges hanging over my head, court appearances, many trips to my lawyers and approximately $12,000 in legal expenses, charges laid against me by the OPP in October 22, 2001, were stayed, just 2 days before my trial was scheduled to proceed. Of course, the police did not have any credible evidence to present in court and never did. Quite simply, the police and the Crown were on a fishing expedition and everyone knew it.

This whole sick charade, from beginning to end, was nothing but a dismal display of incompetence, bias and intimidation by police and the Crown Attorney from the very beginning and a miserable failure of the justice system in the Province of Ontario. This whole horror story started in October of 2001 when police laid charges against me based solely on the false allegations of a lying, conniving, physically violent and child abusing ex-wife who alleged an incident occurred some 18 months previous to that. Coincidentally, her call to police was made at a time when she way trying to gain the upper hand in family court using false allegations to her advantage.

In addition to my huge legal bill, this whole affair has been an absolute nightmare for myself and my family, not to mention my children who knew all the time that it was their mother who was the lying, violent and abusive parent in the family home, not me. My children are now angry and disrespectful of the system after seeing myself charged for something that they knew that it was their mother who was the guilty party.

This comedy of errors and miscarriage of justice against myself and my family has likely cost taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars and resulted in a huge and needless waste of valuable police and court resources. After witnessing, first hand, the kind of lousy, bias, incompetent and unprofessional services by the police and Crown Attorney’s office, I would say that procedures dealing with domestic violence are nothing but a Kangaroo court. It’s no wonder why our courts are backlogged - our police and Crown Attorney’s offices are too busy persecuting good, loving and innocent parents while at the same time helping abusive partners throw their partners in jail.

The actions of the police in accepting at face value the words of a liar and perjurer and the malicious actions of the Crown Attorney’s Office in proceeding with charges based on an incompetent and incomplete police investigation have caused a terrible, terrible, injustice. Many innocent people, including my children and step children, have been greatly harmed by police and the Crown Attorney’s Office. Thousands of dollars of our family’s resources have been spent on legal fees, money which should have gone to my children’s education.

Some of the facts in my case that should be noted: 1) That I was arrested based solely on the word of my ex-partner on an incident that occurred almost one and a half years prior to the date she called police to lay charges. 2) At the time my ex-partner called the police to have charges laid, she was in the middle of trying to get me kicked out of the home so that she could get the upper hand in divorce proceedings, including custody of the children. There clearly was a financial incentive and strategic advantage for her to have charges laid against me when she called police. 3) That I was arrested based on no physical evidence, no medical evidence without any witnesses. Just the words of an angry woman, a known liar, who was trying to kick her husband out of the family house and get custody of the kids were enough. It appears no consideration was given by police as to this woman’s underlying motives. 4) Not only were the children physically assaulted on a number of occasions in the home by their mother, but actually witnessed their mother physically assault me. Neither the police, social workers with the CAS or workers with the Ontario’s Office of the Children’s Lawyer were able to bring this out into the open even though the children told authorities about being physically assaulted by their mother. 5) Under Oath in pre-trial my former partner stated that the children were present when she was allegedly assaulted, yet the police never questioned the children to verify this. They just took the mother’s word as the gospel. Even though the children wanted to tell police and the police were told that the children witnessed events, the police did not even bother to speak to the children to confirm the accuracy of the mother’s statements.

As an indication as to just how incompetent police, CAS and OCL workers are, a few days before the charges were stayed, I managed to locate a child and family advocacy agency, which came to help our family by interviewing the children on videotape. Within hours of their arrival they had managed to interview the children and obtain testimony on tape from the children as to their mother’s abuse of them as well as myself. The children willingly provided testimony which contradicted their mother’s statements to the police and the courts.

In just one afternoon, an outside, community-based and non-government funded agency was able to obtain information from the children about their mother’s abuse. In comparison, neither the police, the Children’s Aid Society or the Office of the Children’s lawyer questioned the children. It seems to me as if authorities deliberately avoided exposing the abuse in order to protect the mother. My stepdaughter told CAS workers that she had been thrown up against a wall by her mother, restrained, slapped and then told by her mother that she was going to “kill” her. What was so alarming was that the Children’s Aid Society told my stepdaughter that this conduct by the mother was “OK” and that sometimes single mothers do this! This same CAS social worker then told the children that she was a single mother herself. It was as if the worker with the Children’s Aid Society was helping the children’s mother hide abuse of the children, just because the social worker was a single mother herself!

This whole matter affecting my family has been nothing but a malicious witch hunt by police and the Crown to extract a guilty plea out of an innocent person and for a crime that the mother had committed. For 18 months I was put under pressure by the authorities, including my own lawyer, to plead guilty to a crime I did not commit. I have been told by many in the system, including lawyers, that police and court officials use these tactics to convict innocent men of domestic violence as part of a campaign to raise the abuse statistics so that women’s groups can get even more of the taxpayer’s money.

Many of those to whom I spoke within the system made their comments “off the record” because of fear of reprisals by others within the court system. I have been told that the blueprint of charging men and putting financial pressure on men with legal expenses is used to extract guilty pleas from them in exchange for a conditional discharge. In effect, the authorities beat men over the head with a big stick and then offer the carrot of a discharge for an admission of guilt. This is tantamount to government sanctioned extortion of fathers by the justice system and in contempt of the principles of Justice! It seems that certain influential people in the Attorney General’s office have crafted a carefully devised strategy intended to convict and/or jail as many innocent men as possible.

Our justice system is supposed to be about “JUSTICE”, not about destroying men and their families. It would seem that the administration of justice in Ontario has turned into nothing but a farce and comedy act where police are allowed to charge good loving fathers based on just the word of angry ex-spouses and where those in the Crown attorney’s office are more concerned about protecting their own behinds than they are about the administration of Justice in this province.

It seems that the whole process is to get the “MAN” charged and convicted, based on no solid evidence and then to let him prove his innocence. The system appears not to be about justice, but about persecution of innocent citizens based on some radical anti-male government agenda.

Ontario advertises itself as place for families to “live and grow”. As a resident of Ontario who was born and raised in this province, I must say that I give this province a miserable failing grade when it comes to being a place for a man to marry and raise his family. It appears that hundreds of millions of dollars are being needlessly wasted by organizations and agencies who profit from the destruction of families and the expansion of these biased, anti-father, domestic violence programs while schools, hospitals and the standard of living of most residents of Ontario gets worse.

Every family in Ontario with male offspring is at risk of being affected at some time in the future unless something to change these utterly ridiculous, and absolutely insane domestic violence laws and procedures which are turning law-abiding people into criminals. The use of false allegations to destroy people’s lives with the support of the Justice System must stop.

My children and I would like to know what you, as our Premiere, are willing to do to help restore Justice in Ontario. Your response and views on the points I have raised would be appreciated.

Yours truly

Xxx Xxxxxx, A victim of Ontario’s domestic violence policies