July 16 Update: Late last night the Star reported that there will be a direct indictment for Dellen Millard and Mark Smich and (some of) the details will be addressed in a court appearance in Hamilton this coming Friday.
I’ve received a few questions from readers lately about the direct indictment in the Tim Bosma murder case. This story in The Mississauga News — reporting that the attorney general would make a decision by June 30 on whether the accused murderers, Dellen Millard and Mark Smich, would go straight to trial — had a lot of people waiting expectantly for answers. But then June 30 came and went, and there was nothing. And now it’s July 15 and no one is yet any the wiser.
Well, here’s the thing — all the information about the direct indictment has come from leaks. The Attorney General has said nothing, zip, nada on the subject. The AG never said publicly, “We’ll have a decision for you June 30.” They’ve never even said that the Crown has requested to proceed by direct indictment.
The initial report on direct indictment came from a reporter and columnist at the Hamilton Spectator with excellent sources. I have no reason to doubt that it was completely correct. The article with the June 30 date came from a reporter I don’t know, who has since removed his tweet on the subject, and who appears not to have had a very reliable source.
I’m also not optimistic that a direct indictment will speed the process up very much. I’ll be surprised if a trial date is set before 2015, which means that even with a supposedly “fast tracked” trial, it will take about two years before everyone gets their day in court. That’s just ridiculous, in my opinion, but such is the sorry state of the Ontario justice system, which desperately needs an overhaul.
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On another subject, I have just published a short ebook called, in a very self explanatory way, The Mysterious Death of Jeffrey Boucher. This was a case that had major media coverage at the beginning and then just slipped off the news agenda. The public was left hanging about what actually happened. My ebook, which is about the length of a long magazine article, attempts to provide some answers.
Buy The Mysterious Death of Jeffrey Boucher on Amazon (or read free sample)
