The Case Of Steven Truscott's Guiltment And Judgement

Steven Truscott, age 14, was sentenced to the death penalty for a schoolmate’s murder, providing little to no evidence then, and still 48 years later. In 1959 Truscott was known and referred to as Canada’s youngest death-row inmate following a short 15-day trial contributing no substantial evidence against him. The evidence that was used to convict Truscott was the forensic evidence given by John Penista, which was later on proven incorrect. Many witnesses came out on what happened the night of Lynn Harpers death but none of these testimonies were included in the original police report.

One of the major issues that were part of this case was the lack of effort put into finding out what the exact details about what happened the day Harper

For a young boy to be thrown into prison blows my mind, not only was the evidence against him not nearly enough to even bring him to trial, but the evidence to be so little and not 100% shows how undetermined the criminal justice system is. In Truscott’s case, there was such a rush to pinpoint who the murderer was. Although such an extreme act was committed, there should have been a lot more things done in favor of proving Truscott’s innocence as opposed to appointing the first suspect guilty. The justice system in this case was fully against a young boy and didn’t give him a chance to be innocent. Not taking into account other suspects such as previous rapist and sex offenders and not listening to key witnesses shows how little the police cared for this child to be proven innocent. Police being a team of people who are supposed to make the general public feel safe, showed a lack of sympathy for Truscott or else his case would have been dealt differently. The justice system is shown as corrupt in this situation because through new research and witnesses coming to the court on what happened the day Harper died, Truscott was still not released from prison until 48 years later. Willingly taking LSD and truth serums to prove his innocence all did not work in his favor. Truscott was sentenced to death, becoming Canadas youngest death-row inmate, his case being very popular even in the time when it took place the popularity did not help out either. The fact that Truscott’s case contributed to Canada abolishing the death penalty shows how incorrect the criminal justice system is at times. My opinion on this case as a whole is that there are defiantly many flaws in the system, this should not be a common thing when it is dealing with a person’s life. Sentencing Truscott for 48 years and been proven innocent after isn’t