How did it go so Wrong??? Well, perhaps it was a combination of factors which are so often found in wrongful convictions, including unreliable and untruthful witnesses, deals made with those unreliable witnesses in exchange for leniency, police "tunnel vision," police coercion, and the deliberate suppression of evidence that does not "fit" the police theory of who committed the crime.
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In this case, many of those factors are present.
A jilted girlfriend, being investigated and arrested on charges of her own, offers to tell police of something bigger and better in exchange for leniency. She concocts a story for police implicating the boyfriend who she is angry with, but who also happens to be innocent of the crime. Police, who have not solved the crime in the four and a half months since it occurred, proceed on the basis of this unreliable witness, and end up disregarding or suppressing any evidence that does not "fit" that theory. Gary Staples was held without bail from April, 1970 until the preliminary inquiry on a charge of non-capital murder in August and September, 1970, and thereafter, following his committal to stand trial, was held without bail until his trial in what was then the Supreme Court of Ontario before a judge and jury, which began in January, 1971.
Now, remember Ken Shellard, the cousin whom Mary Conklin claimed was present for Gary's "confession" to the murder?? Well, Mr. Shellard was called as a witness at the preliminary inquiry, having been transported from prison for the purpose, but he refused to corroborate Mary Conklin's evidence at all.
On the contrary, Shellard denied that any such confession had taken place, and there is evidence to suggest that his anticipated "cooperation" was coerced by investigating officers while he was an inmate at the Burwash facility in Sudbury, Ontario. But when it came down to actually testifying, Mr. Shellard adamantly denied that he had been present for any such "confession." (This evidence is elaborated upon in the Scales of Justice book and radio show, which will be highlighted on a future page in this site.)
Not to be thwarted, Mary Conklin subsequently, and with the assistance of the investigating officers and other members of the Hamilton Police, changed her story, and testified that Ken Shellard had been asleep when Gary Staples arrived at her house in the evening of December 5, and that she and Gary had gone to the kitchen and were alone when he allegedly confessed to the murder.
Conklin's evidence also changed in a number of other material regards at various points throughout the proceedings.
The trial commenced on January 13, 1971. Gary Staples was convicted ten days later, on January 23, 1971, and was sentenced to spend the "rest of his natural life" in prison. Young James Johnston was called as a witness at the preliminary hearing and at the trial to give his testimony as to seeing a single person at the scene of the murder.
Neither Wayne Salisbury nor his wife were called as witnesses, nor was any mention of them ever made to the court, the Crown, or the defence. |
