DAILY GLEANER - FREDERICTON, NEGLIGENT NEWSPAPER REPORTER
To Anne Mooers .....Managing Editor of the Daily Gleaner,
Ms Mooers,
This is to confirm my complaints about Don MacPherson's (picture provided below) inaccurate reporting that is damaging to the public interest.
Mr
MacPherson does no investigative journalism whatsoever and stated that
he just writes what he hears in court - well, he doesn't do that
either.
In
the article of 24 Jan 2013 Mr MacPherson stated that it was Jenn
Wambolt's lawyer who stated the option of sending Jenn to Campbellton
for thirty days and it was not - it was the Crown Prosecutor who
demanded that several times until the judge told him that was not going
to happen and if Ms Wambolt did not want to go to Campbellton then he
could not send her there for thirty days.
Mr MacPherson did not report that Claude Hache tried to violate Ms Wambolt's Charter Right and Freedom not to be involuntarily incarcerated without proof of its necessity. The Crown Prosecutor filed no motion for the defense to respond to and neither filed nor presented any evidence whatsoever for the judge to contemplate taking this mother and wife away from her husband and children for thirty days - and did not ask for an opportunity to do this.
The
Crown argued for Ms Wambolt's removal to Campbellton until the judge
told him that it just wasn't going to happen and, since Ms Wambolt
already has a psychiatrist they simply need to request his report on her
mental health at the time of the alleged incident.
What
is also disturbing about Mr MacPherson not fully reporting the facts of
this story is the fact that the Crown Prosecution Services are wasting
public money on a frivolous prosecution that was instigated by Barry
MacKnight when he was Chief of Police, and behaving in a professionally
questionable manner, which lead to Fredericton City Police Force
receiving more complaints that any other in New Brunswick. Not only is
the Crown wasting money on unnecessary court proceedings against an
unwell person, the Crown wanted to pay to transport her under guard to a
public psychiatric facility for thirty days. How much would that have
cost this province?
When
Mr MacPherson was reporting my own issues he incorrectly stated I had
fired two legal aid lawyers; I wrote and told him this was wrong and I
have evidence that they withdrew their service, which they had not
grounds to do, and I requested that Mr MacPherson print a correction,
since legal aid frequently dump clients without cause. Mr MacPherson
replied to me by email saying "It's just semantics." Since when did
inaccurate and incorrect reporting become semantics?
While
we
have Blaine Higgs touring this province and the Government of New
Brunswick scratching their heads to find ways to cut expenditure the
Gleaner should be reporting such blatant and negligent wasting of money
in the courts and the criminal justice system.
I look forward to your response.
Sarah Brooks
