Freddie P's Blog

August 29, 2007 @ 08:01

I felt as good as I could for Steven Truscott yesterday. He was justifiably acquitted of the murder of Lynn Harper yesterday, but it was a long and grueling, horribly unnecessary road.

He was acquitted, but not found innocent.

I've always had a special interest in this case because of a book I read in 1971 called the Steven Truscott Story written by Bill Trent after several interviews with Truscott.

I wanted to read the book because I had heard my mother talk about Steven Truscott on many occasions when I was a kid, and when I got the book I was precisely the age Truscott was when he was sentenced to hang.

Fourteen years old. Still a child.

When the book was published Truscott had already been in jail for 12 years and he was only 23 years old, unheard of in today's justice system but even more bizarre after you read this book, or any other book for that matter on the Truscott case.

Steven Truscott was the victim of a bungling local police force and one detective in particular who was more concerned with solving a case than he was putting an innocent kid behind bars.

To even consider that a 14 year old could be capable of the deplorable things that were done to Lynne Harper is ridicilous.

There was no case against Steven Truscott but that didn't matter to those who wanted accolades for solving a murder and the kid never stood a chance. And to make matters worse, the Crown took over after that and badgered Truscott long after he was released from prison and through several attempts to clear his name.

It became an embarrassment for a justice system and there was a long line up of people more concerned with saving face than they were serving justice.

Yesterday Truscott wasn't found innocent because it's literally impossible to do that without DNA evidence. But he was acquitted and in this case that's just as good because looking back there's no doubt that Steven Truscott had nothing to do with the murder of 12 year old Lynne Harper.

The only questions left to be asked are these, one of which will never be answered.

We'll never know who really killed Lynne Harper because there's a good chance whoever did is dead and buried.

The other question is this. How much does the Province of Ontario owe Steven Truscott?

Compensation is more than justified and considering that David Milgaard go ten million for spending 23 years in prison for nothing, Truscott definitely has to be in that category.

Although he only spent 10 years in prison, his life has been a living hell for close to 50 years and someone has to pay.