Noted human rights lawyer eyes Sinclair inquest

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This article was published 31/03/2010 (5905 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

RENOWNED criminal and human rights lawyer Clayton Ruby will enter the ongoing case this morning of Brian Sinclair, found dead after waiting 34 hours in the Health Sciences Centre’s emergency department in 2008.

What Ruby will do or say isn’t clear — the Sinclair family’s Toronto lawyer, Vilko Zbogar, said Tuesday Ruby will not be representing the family at an inquest here. The details will come out this morning at a Toronto news conference Ruby is holding, Zbogar said.

"He’s been retained in a limited capacity to provide some assistance. He won’t represent the family at the inquest," said Zbogar. He and Ruby are from different law firms in Toronto.

"He’s one of the — if not the — pre-eminent criminal lawyers in Canada," said Zbogar.

Sinclair, a wheelchair-bound aboriginal man, was found dead on Sept. 21, 2008, after he waited 34 hours in the Health Sciences Centre ER without being treated for a bladder infection that required a simple catheter change and antibiotics.

The Manitoba government has just boosted the amount it is prepared to pay the lawyer representing Sinclair’s family at an upcoming inquest into the man’s death.

Justice Minister Andrew Swan said the province will provide $110,000 — nearly triple the $40,000 it offered last year.

A news release said Ruby will hold a press conference "to discuss an important legal and human rights issue arising out of the tragic death of Brian Sinclair."

The Winnipeg Regional Health Authority says it is not aware of Ruby’s involvement. A date has not yet been set for the inquest, which is expected to last more than 50 days.

Ruby’s law firm says he "has devoted his professional career to ensuring that those who are underprivileged and those who face discrimination are given equal access to the legal system of this country."

Among Ruby’s many cases, according to the Ruby & Shiller Barristers website:

— He represented Donald Marshall Jr., who spent 11 years in jail after being wrongly convicted of murder, at the Royal Commission on the Donald Marshall Jr. Prosecution, which brought wrongful miscarriages of justice under new and more careful scrutiny;

— He negotiated a settlement for the three surviving Dionne quintuplets, who were removed from their parents by the provincial government in 1934 and put on display in Quintland, a commercial theme park designed to boost Ontario’s depression-ravaged economy;

— He obtained an acquittal for Guy Paul Morin, who was wrongfully accused of murdering a child, at Morin’s first trial. After subsequent appeals and conviction, Morin showed by DNA evidence he could not have committed the offence.

nick.martin@freepress.mb.ca