AIDWYC
The Association in
Defence of the Wrongly Convicted
The
Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted (AIDWYC) will be hosting “BACK
to the FUTURE” a day-long educational conference, gala dinner and an evening of
festivities in recognition of its 20th Anniversary.
Saturday, November 23, 2013
Hyatt Regency
370 King St W Toronto, ON M5V 1J9
JASON
BALDWIN (West Memphis
Three) to be Keynote Speaker at AIDWYC’s Gala Dinner.
Interviews
can be scheduled for all participants as well as AIDWYC’s Co-Presidents
Jonathan Freedman and Ralph Steinberg:
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Gala
Keynote Speaker, Jason Baldwin (West Memphis Three)—one of three teenagers wrongly
imprisoned for 18 years for the murder of three eight-year-old boys in West
Memphis, Arkansas. Mr. Baldwin and
his two co-accused were released in 2011.
Mr. Baldwin joins a long list of wrongly convicted Canadians and
Americans who will be in Toronto to participate in this milestone event.
Conference
–reflecting
on past convictions through the lens of today’s developments in forensic
sciences, research and evidence and working towards preventing and correcting
wrongful convictions in the future.
Topics to be discussed by leading
experts in their fields include: History of Innocence Work, Shaken Baby
Syndrome, the Role of the Crown in Preventing Wrongful Convictions, the Role of
Bias in the System, False Confessions/Plea Bargains, the relationship between
Forensic Science and Miscarriages of Justice and the Long Way Home – the
wrongly convicted and their families share their stories.
The
conference will include exoneree and AIDWYC Board member Ron Dalton who was incarcerated for 9
years for a non-murder before being exonerated. Also participating
amongst many others will be the Wrongly Convicted and their Families, Toronto lawyer and AIDWYC
co-founder James Lockyer, New York lawyers and co-founder’s of the Innocence Project Barry
Scheck and Peter
Neufeld, the
godfather of innocence work and founder of Centurion Ministries, James
McCloskey, co-host of the Fifth Estate, Linden
MacIntyre,
Special advisor to the Commissioner of the Elliot Lake Inquiry and former
Special Advisor on wrongful convictions to the Department of Justice, Stephen
Bindman,
retired Kingston, Ontario Chief of Police, William Closs, Judge Anne Derrick, QC of the Provincial and
Family Court of Nova Scotia, Professor Tim Moore from the Department of Psychology at Glendon College , who
is a consultant and expert witness in criminal trials both in Canada and the
United States, Justice Murray Sinclair,
Chair of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada.
The
media and public are welcome to attend “Back to the Future”. Tickets can be purchased through
AIDWYC’s website www.aidwyc.org.
Jason
Baldwin, Damien Echols and Jessie Misskelley Jr. (West Memphis Three) were tried and
convicted as teenagers in 1994 of the 1993 murders of three boys. Mr. Echols was sentenced to death; Mr.
Misskelley Jr. and Jason Baldwin were sentenced to life imprisonment with two
20-year sentences added to Mr. Misskelley’s life sentence.
The
West Memphis Three were released in part due to dedicated attorneys, a skilled
private investigator, a series of documentary films produced by HBO, half a
dozen books; hundreds of magazine, newspaper, and television features which
drew international attention to their case. Canadian filmmaker Atom Egoyan will be releasing a feature
film, Devil’s Knot, the true story of the West Memphis Three case, starring Reese Witherspoon
and Colin Firth.
Atom
Egoyan has
dramatized for the screen the story of the West Memphis Three. The film previewed to critical acclaim at the Toronto
International Film Festival (TIFF) earlier this fall. Critics see this as an important film that is as compelling
and disturbing as the truth itself.
Egoyan is a master at telling tales about deeply misunderstood
outsiders, their families and communities, and their darkest fantasies. In Devil’s Knot Egoyan details the
small-town lives of ordinary people befuddled and angered by the senseless
killing in their ostensibly safe town and the private investigator for whom the
sum of the case’s parts doesn’t quite add up, and who is driven to get at the
truth.
AIDWYC’s
“Back to the Future” conference will educate the legal profession, the
judiciary and law enforcement and compel them to respect society’s ethical
obligation to reverse wrongful convictions when evidence proves a miscarriage
of justice has occurred.
A number of high profile musicians and
actors including Eddie Vedder, the Dixie Chicks and Johnnie Depp worked hard to
secure their release based on flaws in their original trial and DNA evidence.
The Association in
Defence of the Wrongly Convicted is a national, non-profit, charitable
organization dedicated to identifying, advocating for, and exonerating
individuals convicted of a crime that they did not commit and to preventing
such injustices in the future through education and reform.
For Further
Information Please Contact:
Debbie Oakley at doakley@rogers.com
or 416-648-4275 or Stephen Weir at 416-801-3101 or 416-489-5868. stephen@stephenweir.com
