Her son was murdered over 4 years ago. Why there still hasn’t been a trial

Almost five years after her son was found murdered, justice remains uncertain for Susan Forsyth.

The man charged with killing her only child, Jeffrey Johnston, in the Oshawa home where he was renting a room, still hasn’t stood trial because of repeated delays attributed to both the defence, with the accused changing lawyers several times, then the pandemic.

A jury trial was set for the fall of 2020. Then COVID closed the courts, delaying the trial to 2021. The case was confronted with yet another delay and the trial was rescheduled for February, around the same time jury trials across Ontario were suspended again because of the Omicron variant.

Now the trial, which is expected to last four weeks, is scheduled to start this November, after it was pushed back again by the defence. It will be 59 months from Johnston’s death.

“You can’t let any family sit for 59 months. That’s just way too long for any kind of closure,” Forsyth told CityNews in an interview. “I just shake my head at the whole justice system and I’m shocked. If I’d heard these stories from someone, I wouldn’t have believed it. And now I’m actually living it.”

While the Ministry of the Attorney General told CityNews jury trials do not appear to be tracked by the Superior Court of Justice, court closures have disproportionally left jury trials lingering in limbo because they must be heard in person and require courtroom space.

When asked how waiting has made her feel as Ontario’s court backlog gets bigger, Forsyth said, “It’s just sad that the government allows this. I can’t answer why, they can.”

What’s delaying justice?

Last fall, the province announced it would spend $72 million over the next two years for more court staff, including Crown prosecutors. The Ministry of the Attorney General told CityNews that money is already working its way through the system.

But defence lawyers have sounded the alarm about how the money is being distributed, noting it’s not going where it’s needed the most to clear the backlog.

“You need to properly fund Legal Aid in order to have a functioning system, otherwise chaos will continue to ensue and that’s what we’ve been seeing,” said Cassandra DeMelo, a criminal defence lawyer based in London, Ont. When an individual’s ability to access counsel is limited, that individual may have no choice but to become self-represented and that clogs up the entire system and creates more delays, DeMelo said.

“Whether you like lawyers or not, we do help chip away at that pile of cases that is ever growing, and we cut to the chase. We’re able to get you to the finish line faster.”

The unequal distribution of the new provincial money, which included no funding for accused persons who want to go to trial, is a concern echoed by Gurratan Singh, the NDP MPP candidate in Brampton East and former opposition critic for the Attorney General.

“When you have a well-funded Crown and a well-funded defence, it ensures that matters are being dealt with appropriately,” Singh told CityNews in an interview.

Too many Ontarians are still not getting the support they need to resolve their cases, he said, putting additional pressure on a justice system that was already under serious strain pre-COVID.

Political promises

In 2019, the Ford government slashed funding to Legal Aid Ontario by $133 million. If elected, both the NDP and the Liberals say they will reverse the cuts.

In a statement to CityNews, the Liberals said they will, “strengthen our legal system and ensure that everybody has access to justice by making the badly needed investments necessary to address these backlogs and make the system more accessible and efficient for everyone.”

The NDP said they will increase funding for summary legal advice, unbundled legal services, and public interest litigation, and ensure more people qualify for legal assistance and will work with Legal Aid to provide those supports.

Meanwhile, the Greens said the best way to free up the court system backlog is to get people out of the justice system who should not be there in the first place.

They say they will work with the feds to decriminalize drug use and ensure that court mental health workers are available in all regions of Ontario.

The press secretary for Doug Ford’s Attorney General stopped responding to emails from CityNews regarding requests for an interview with Doug Downey.

5 years later, no justice and no help

Forsyth has reached out to several elected officials and others in hopes of getting the wheels of justice to turn faster for cases involving serious offences like murder. She’s been told many times, because the case involving her son’s death is still open, no one can assist her.

“When they’re finally able to help me according to them, I won’t need their help anymore. That’s frustrating.”

When asked if she’s hopeful the next government will make fixing the system a priority and restore timely delivery of justice, Forsyth said no.

“I’ve reached out to the attorney general and with nothing,” she said. “So does that mean anything to me? Absolutely not.”