Marquardt Case Summary

When an individual is charged and convicted of an offence in the criminal justice system, it is expected, and essentially assumed, that the person truly is ‘guilty’ of the offence in question and will consequently suffer the punishment deemed appropriate. This is the essence of the criminal justice system- the carrying out of justice for wrongdoers. How then, can one excuse the courts for a miscarriage of justice, when an individual is wrongfully convicted and sentenced to serve imprisonment for a crime he or she did not commit? Tammy Marquardt suffered this exact fate when she was deemed guilty of the second-degree murder of her two and a half year old son, Kenneth, in 1995 and sentenced to life behind bars. It seems ludicrous to think that an event such as this could occur when such high expectations and confidence are placed in the criminal justice system, however, many of the same factors are often at play in wrongful convictions and Tammy Marquardt’s case is no

exception. Commonalities found to be shared among many wrongful convictions include “strength of prosecution’s case, prosecution withheld evidence, strength of defendant’s case, age of defendant, criminal history of defendant” (J. Johnson, 2013). Ms. Marquardt was unfortunately subject to many of these factors, accompanied by a flawed expert testimony, leading to her conviction. These contributory factors will be discussed at length to demonstrate why they are very frequently present in wrongful convictions. Tammy Marquardt was convicted of a murder she did not commit due to the ‘strength‘ of the prosecution’s case headed by Dr. Charles Smith’s expert testimony, misconduct of the parties involved, media bias, falsified evidence, along with her age, social status and prior criminal history at the time of the trial.
EXPERT TESTIMONY
Achieving “an intelligent evaluation of facts is often difficult or impossible without the application of some scientific, technical, or other specialized knowledge”. This knowledge, more often than not, comes from an expert witness (Federal Evidence Review, 2014). The purpose of an expert witness in a trial is “to tell the jury, not facts, ... but general truths derived from his specialized experience”, remaining fundamentally neutral and avoid becoming “a hired champion of one side” (Hand, 1901). Dr. Charles Smith, a pediatric forensic pathologist was the expert acquired by the prosecution for Tammy Marquardt’s case, and also the primary reason why she lived behind bars for over thirteen years.
The role of Dr. Smith in this case was simple- to perform an autopsy of Kenneth Marquardt to determine the cause of his death. The problem, however, lay in the fact that Dr. Smith was not an honest man. He spun a web of lies throughout his medical career, including the attainment of his prestigious position at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, Ontario. He was appointed as the director of the pediatric forensic pathology unit, yet had “no formal training in forensic pathology nor board certification in that field” (Goudge, 2008). The question lies in how he became such a dominant figure in this field when his expertise had no legitimate basis in forensic pathology. Being a pediatric pathologist meant he was trained to study disease in children and had no standing to study cases when a crime was suspected (Goudge, 2008). Despite this, he performed many autopsies on young children and reached his own conclusions, which proved time and time again to be false. “In 2005, Ontario’s chief coroner ordered a review of 44 autopsies Smith had conducted, [in which] thirteen had resulted in criminal charges and convictions” (The Globe and Mail, 2011). It is no coincidence that many, if not all, of the cases that Dr. Smith took part in concluded in wrongful convictions of a parent or family member who was marginalized by society and struggled with parenthood and livelihood. He has attempted to defend himself by explaining that he provided the police with the “indicators about mothers who kill their babies” to be helpful (Goudge, 2008). An effort to be ‘helpful’ should not result in thirteen known wrongful convictions of parents he viewed as unfit. “In his autopsy report, Smith speculated that Marquardt had killed her child because she had acted out of anger over the chaos in her own life” (Shapiro, 2011). This speculation was entirely inappropriate as it could not be substantiated in the slightest, while it also painted a picture of Tammy Marquardt as a crazed woman who murdered her own child from a loss of composure. For the reason that Dr. Smith’s expert testimony was central to the prosecution’s contention that Tammy suffocated her son in a moment of frustration (AIDWYC, 2013), it is unsurprising that she was found guilty by jury when the opinions of such a then well-respected expert were so forceful. To make matters worse, he “lied, hid evidence and used junk science, [doing] what it took to get a conviction” (Shapiro, 2011).
The wrongful conviction of Tammy Marquardt was also aided by the misconduct of the parties involved. Goudge (2008) claimed that Smith, other medical experts and prosecutors operated with a “think dirty” mindset, which presumes guilt first, rather than the ‘innocent until proven guilty‘ doctrine highly valued in the justice system. “The Goudge Commission found the actual words ‘think dirty’ in instructions from Ontario’s chief coroners, pathologists and police chiefs in 1995” (Shapiro, 2011). In Ms. Marquardt’s case, there is no way to conceal the fact that the professionals of the adversarial system did not satisfactorily perform their roles. It has already been demonstrated that Dr. Charles Smith “saw his role as supporting the prosecution, as opposed to providing impartial evidence” as an expert witness should (Roach, 2013).
SUPPRESSION/ FALSIFICATION OF EVIDENCE
Suppression or falsification of evidence is a very common factor leading to a wrongful conviction because without disclosure, the case cannot be presented in full and key information in the deciding of guilt or innocence may be hidden.

In Tammy Marquardt’s case, evidence related to Kenneth’s death was both suppressed and falsified by Dr. Charles Smith. “Kenneth suffered from a number of serious health issues including asthma, pneumonia and epilepsy. The latter condition caused frequent and extremely severe seizures which saw Kenneth hospitalized several times over the course of his short life” (AIDWYC, 2013). The many medical issues and diagnosed epilepsy were not considered as a possible lead to the baby’s death- it was cemented in the minds of the jury that his mother was to blame, not his health. “Dr. Smith played a vital role in [the] trial and presented evidence that convinced the jury that Kenneth was a homocide victim, through smothering or strangulation”

(smithforensice.blogspot).
Kenneth was found by his mother, as he called for her, helplessly tangled in his bedsheets. If Dr. Charles Smith was so convinced that strangulation had been the cause of death, it was never once mentioned that the culprit could have been the very sheets he was struggling against. This proves yet again how Dr. Smith targeted Tammy Marquardt, ignoring all other possibilities of death to solely focus on how she was a failing parent and killed her baby.
AGE, SOCIAL STATUS, “EASY TARGETS”
It can be argued that Dr. Charles Smith attacked easy targets; many of those he helped convict shared parenting similarities. James Lockyer, a Toronto lawyer and a founding director of the Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted (AIDWYC), represented Marquardt and several others in which Smith played a part in the conviction. He asserts that being an “easy, easy mark” was the common denominator among those he helped exonerate from Smith’s wrongdoing and “Tammy was a good example of an easy mark [being] a young, single mother who was impoverished and on welfare” (Shapiro, 2011). It becomes very clear that Charles Smith targeted his victims regardless of the evidence found to support their guilt or innocence. He speculated on issues that were so far from his line of duty as a medical expert, raising legitimate concern of his intention to fulfill his assigned role, or if he wanted to be a hero for the prosecution and secure convictions of ‘failed parents’.