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You are here: Home / Featured / Court of Appeal overturns Justice Lawrence O’Neil’s ruling giving custody of a child to man with a history of domestic abuse

Court of Appeal overturns Justice Lawrence O’Neil’s ruling giving custody of a child to man with a history of domestic abuse

Lawrence O'Neil, the Associate Chief Justice of the Nova Scotia Family Court, awarded custody of a small child to a father with a history of domestic assault, downplayed another allegation of domestic assault against the father, implied that the mother was lying, and accused the police of misleading the court. O'Neil also ordered the arrest of the mother. Today, the Court of Appeal overturns the custody ruling and quashes the arrest warrant.

June 12, 2018 By Tim Bousquet Leave a Comment

Associate Chief Justice Lawrence O’Neil. Photo: Nova Scotia Barristers Society

In November 2017, the Halifax Examiner reported that:

In August [2017], Lawrence O’Neil, the Associate Chief Justice of the Family Court, awarded custody of a five-year-old boy to the child’s father, who has a history of domestic violence, even though the father had previously signed away his right to custody.

After the Examiner wrote about the case, the story was picked up by Huffington Post reporter Zi-Ann Lum, who interviewed the mother for her piece “Nowhere to Turn: A secretive government service was supposed to protect an abused mom. A judge undid it all.”

Today, the courts published a decision of the Nova Scotia Court of Appeal which overturns O’Neil’s ruling and quashes an arrest warrant he had issued for the child’s mother. The decision of the three-judge appeal panel was written by Justice David P.S. Farrar.

The ruling is noteworthy in its strong condemnation of O’Neil.

“The problem with the trial judge’s conclusion is there was absolutely no evidence before him on the best interests of the child,” wrote Farrar.

Particularly vexing to Farrar was O’Neil’s bizarre view that three different police agencies and Legal Aid were colluding to, in effect, lie to the court. Farrar wrote:

Not only is the judge calling into question the motives of [the mother] but also those of Legal Aid and the various police forces. All of this without any evidence before him that there was any kind of collusion between these agencies.

Farrar’s ruling makes clear that O’Neil ignored significant evidence that the mother was seeking refuge as an abused woman:

As a result of [the mother’s] call to victim services, the QPP contacted the Halifax Regional Police. They found there were a number of complaints from 2012 to 2015 and even charges. As a result of their inquiries, QPP was satisfied that her safety was in jeopardy and placed her under protection.

It was clearly explained to the judge that the QPP had a protocol when faced with this type of complaint, it followed the protocol and came to the conclusion that [the mother’s] safety was in jeopardy.

…

Any attempts by the police forces to explain why they conducted themselves in the way they did was ignored or not accepted by the judge.

There can be no other conclusion but that the manner in which this matter proceeded resulted in a substantial wrong or miscarriage of justice.

Another particularly ugly aspect of this case was that O’Neil allowed testimony from the father about a psychological assessment of the mother, but that assessment wasn’t entered into as evidence:

In fact, at the April 11, 2017 court appearance, [the father] had the psychological assessment with him but did not want to put it into evidence. For good reason, as it is not particularly complimentary of him.

…

[The father] was indicating that he had the report but he was not asking that it be entered into evidence. In fact, quite appropriately, he said that he did not think the court would accept it.

Not only did the judge accept it, he relied on it in making his decision.

The judge was also selective in the parts of the report which he used in his decision. For example, in his decision, he finds that [the mother] was threatening or planning to commit suicide triggering the CFSA proceedings in 2014 (¶11). The report actually says that [the mother]. denied any intention to commit suicide. A medical assessment done at that time highlighted that there was no intent to commit suicide.

You can read the entire decision here.

 

Filed Under: Featured, News Tagged With: custody, domestic assault, Huffington Post, Justice David P.S. Farrar, Justice Lawrence O'Neil, Man with history of domestic assault awarded custody, miscarriage of justice, Zi-Ann Lum

About Tim Bousquet

Tim Bousquet is the editor and publisher of the Halifax Examiner. email: [email protected]; Twitter

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The Tideline, with Tara Thorne

Phyllis Rising — Rebecca Falvey (left) and Meg Hubley. Photo submitted

Episode #19 of The Tideline, with Tara Thorne is published.

Meg Hubley and Rebecca Falvey met as theatre kids at Neptune and have been friends ever since. As Phyllis Rising — that’s right, Mary Tyler Moore hive — they’re making films, plays, and are in production on The Crevice, a three-part sitcom streaming live from the Bus Stop in March. They stop by to talk with Tara about its development, their shared love of classic SNL and 90s sitcoms, and the power of close friendship. Plus: A new song from a new band.

This episode is available today only for premium subscribers; to become a premium subscriber, click here, and join the select group of arts and entertainment supporters for just $5/month. Everyone else will have to wait until tomorrow to listen to it.

Please subscribe to The Tideline.

Uncover: Dead Wrong

In 1995, Brenda Way was brutally murdered behind a Dartmouth apartment building. In 1999, Glen Assoun was found guilty of the murder. He served 17 years in prison, but steadfastly maintained his innocence. In 2019, Glen Assoun was fully exonerated.

Halifax Examiner founder and investigative journalist Tim Bousquet has followed the story of Glen Assoun's wrongful conviction for over five years. Now, Bousquet tells that story as host of Season 7 of the CBC podcast series Uncover: Dead Wrong.

Click here to go to listen to the podcast, or search for CBC Uncover on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast aggregator.

About the Halifax Examiner

Examiner folk The Halifax Examiner was founded by investigative reporter Tim Bousquet, and now includes a growing collection of writers, contributors, and staff. Left to right: Joan Baxter, Stephen Kimber, Linda Pannozzo, Erica Butler, Jennifer Henderson, Iris the Amazing, Tim Bousquet, Evelyn C. White, El Jones, Philip Moscovitch More about the Examiner.

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