Walker's SCATHING INDICTMENT - Part 5 of 6 - Trial Two

This is my synopsized prose version of Justice Walker's 140-page judgement presented in several segments that reveal the substance of Walker's overview of evidence that demanded his verdict against the Ministry of Children's Child Protection. No stated opinion or fact appears here that does not also appear in the Justice Walker's ruling (legal document). It is public information

In Trial Two the plaintiffs sought damages based on the tort of misfeasance, alleging intentional and reckless misconduct by the Director and her agents acting in breach of the standard of care as well as fiduciary duty, being motivated by bad faith and malice. The same claim for costs was made at first trial but put over to the second trial. More specifically in Trail Two plaintiffs claimed that the Director and her agents failed to protect the children from B.G.; failed to investigate reports of sexual and physical abuse; wrongfully apprehended the children from their mother; unreasonably held the unjustifiable belief that J.P. was unfit to parent; ignored Court orders; abandoned statutory obligations. The result has been ongoing emotional harm to the children from abuse by B.G. and from being withheld from their mother for two and one-half years. Further, while in the care of the Director the youngest child, P.G. was sexually abused because of the unsupervised access.  

In Justice Walker's Second Trial judgement, for ease of reference, he referred to the Director and her agents as the “Director”. The Director and the Ministry cannot be sued. Therefore, the defendant was the Province of British Columbia since the Province is responsible for the Director and the Ministry. The Province denied any basis for a finding of misfeasance, asserting that the Director fulfilled all common law and statutory duties to the children. B.G. denied all claims against him.  Judge Walker in his ruling certainly disagreed. He determined that the infant plaintiffs established the liability of the Province for negligence and breach of fiduciary duty owed to them. The plaintiffs, including J.P., also proved the misfeasance claim. Judge Walker determined that the Director and certain Ministry social workers acted well outside of their statutory mandate and the duty to protect children and that the nature of their libelous handling of the case varied depending on the individual. It ranged from intentional misconduct, bad faith, reckless disregard for their obligation to protect children, breach of the applicable standard of care to unreasonably supporting the custodial interests of the children’s father even if it meant he sexually abused them.

TERMS OF JUSTICE / Part 335 / For Love and For Justice / Zabeth and Paul Bayne

Given our Canadian Rights and Freedoms, a miscarriage of justice within our Canadian legal and social context is essentially the conviction and punishment of a person for a crime that he/she did not commit. Synonymous with miscarriage of justice is the term 'wrongful conviction' which refers to conviction reached in an unfair and disputed trial. Occasionally the biased term 'travesty of justice' is applied to an offensive and deliberate miscarriage of justice

There are avenues by which to quash or overturn a wrongful conviction but these are difficult to navigate and achieve. We all agree that the most grievous cases are wrongful convictions that are not overturned for many years or before the convicted but innocent person dies by execution or natural death while incarcerated.

But here we are discussing not a criminal but a civil matter, a child protection issue, where the suspicion card is played as strategically and effectively as the evidence card. The suspicion card is an incredible card because it permits the player to proceed directly to the goal without passing GO and yet collects thousands of dollars en route. That's what has happened to date. Now however, the court case required the player to present the suspicion so convincingly that suspicion should be regarded as equivalent to evidence. Circumstantial is to be regarded as actual. What a leap! What an hypothesis! What fertile ground for ---------MISCARRIAGE OF JUSTICE.

In the case of the Baynes what we have is not a conviction at all because there have been no legal criminal charges brought against the Baynes. So, no, they have not been wrongfully convicted. Yet a penalty has been imposed already, not only upon a mom and dad who are suspected by the Ministry of Children of harming their youngest child, but also upon the three children whom we all would concur are truly innocent. October 22^nd is quickly approaching, the date that marks the removal of the children in 2007. This family has been enduring this penalty, surviving somehow, for the past almost three years.

How Mss. Polak and Dutoit cannot be concerned, or troubled, perhaps appalled, intelligibly sickened by the injustice of this aspect of their Ministry operations I fail to understand. At least be attentive to it. Forget that this case has been before the court since January. There was ample time before the actual court date for a top level intervention, some kind of compassionate involvement to second-guess and inquire into the case handling by the Fraser Valley Region of the Provincial MCFD mandate.

Let's suppose that the Judge's ruling does not move in favour of the Baynes. The children remain in provincial foster care. Let's suppose it proceeds beyond that to the adoption of the children.

Years in care can have a substantial, irreversible effect on the maturing child becoming an adolescent and an adult. In a case such as the Baynes, a CCO (Continuing Care Order) with its potential for adopting the child to new adoptive parents, the child will never have cause to believe that one or more parent did not abuse her when she was an infant. Their reputations will never have been officially untarnished. She may want nothing to do with her birth parents when she is of age to find them. Her sibling brothers may or may not be adopted with her. The sibling relationship will be effectively severed. And the boys if they remain together may always wonder why the parents with whom they could not live for three years but who visited them faithfully during those three years dropped out of sight and didn't visit any longer. And Paul and Zabeth, fifteen and twenty years from now will be moving out of middle age with hearts wounded irreparably and with lives scarred deeply because the children who were their life, have never been a part of it. 

Judge Crabtree must decide against the Continuing Care Order, forget the Last Chance Order/Temporary Care Order, or any other option that credits the MCFD with any credibility whatsoever. Allow the children to return to their parents. It is the right thing to do. It is IN THE BEST INTERESTS OF THE CHILDREN!