Man acquitted in infant son’s death
Posted January 20, 2011 5:46 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
TORONTO, Ont. – Ontario’s highest court has acquitted a man who pleaded guilty in the death of his infant son 19 years ago.
Dinesh Kumar was charged with second-degree murder in the death of his five-week-old son Gaurov in 1992.
He pleaded guilty to criminal negligence causing death and prosecutors offered him 90 days of weekend jail, and he said he took it for his family.
“I [already lost] my son, right? And I don’t want to lose a second one. So, that is why I take that decision. I need my family,” he said.
Kumar was under a “multitude of pressures” when he made the plea, his lawyer writes in court filings, not the least of which was the expert opinion of now-disgraced Dr. Charles Smith.
Smith concluded Gaurov died of shaken baby syndrome.
But in material filed with the Court of Appeal for Ontario, new opinions from various medical experts have found that Smith’s conclusion is no longer scientifically valid.
Lawyer James Lockyer argued the science has changed since then and Gaurov was not shaken to death.
“It doesn’t do away the 18 years,” Lockyer said. “But it does a heck of a lot.”
Kumar was in tears, as the horrifying details of the night were read in the courtroom.
He was cradling his crying son at 1 a.m., when Gaurov began gasping for air, and turned blue. The child could not be revived.
The court set aside Kumar’s conviction Thursday, calling it unreasonable.
Kumar said he carried around the shame, and was the subject of harsh community gossip.
“I am in hell […] You know, the pointing behind my back. They say, ‘That’s the guy who killed his own son.'”
A judicial inquiry into Smith’s work found the pathologist’s testimony was responsible, in part, for several people being wrongfully convicted of killing children and being sentenced to prison.
While the Crown agreed Kumar’s conviction shouldn’t stand, it pointed out his guilty plea was valid at the time and based on current medical knowledge.
Kumar will take his exoneration letter, to staple it up to the bulletin board at his temple.
