A woman’s conviction for murdering her ex-husband has been overturned on appeal, the latest development in an unsettling case in which three members of the same family were found dead in the same home over a five-year period.
The Ontario Court of Appeal on Thursday overturned Melissa Merritt’s first-degree murder conviction in the killing of her ex-husband Caleb Harrison, and ordered a new trial.. The top court on Thursday found that Superior Court Justice Fletcher Dawson made two serious errors in his instructions to the jury regarding key evidence, requiring that Merritt’s conviction be overturned.
“We are profoundly saddened and extremely disappointed by this news,” said Wanda Jamieson, a family friend speaking on behalf of the Harrison and Blackwell families, on Thursday.Fattore and Merritt were charged and tried together and Fattore was found guilty of murdering both Caleb and Bridget. His convictions were upheld on appeal.
“Winning her appeal is just one step — albeit a significant one — towards finally clearing her name,” Halfyard said. The Crown alleged at trial that Merritt and Fattore conspired to kill Caleb and Bridget during an acrimonious custody dispute, but that only Fattore committed the acts. Merritt’s defence lawyer argued there was no evidence she conspired to kill anyone.
Merritt was interested in finding out what Fattore had already told police. He said he confessed to the murders of Caleb and Bridget but that he planned to recant. They discussed her potential culpability as an accessory after the fact, says the ruling. The other error Dawson made in his instructions was regarding statements Merritt made to police, the appeal court said.
“The Crown had no direct evidence implicating Ms. Merritt, and, in my view, a properly instructed jury could be left with a reasonable doubt on the circumstantial evidence as to whether Ms. Merritt was an accessory after the fact to Caleb’s murder, rather than a party to the killing,” Paciocco wrote in the appeal ruling.
Bill’s cause of death was listed as “acute cardiac arrhythmia,” but at Merritt and Fattore’s subsequent trial, Ontario’s chief forensic pathologist testified that the autopsy should have been more thorough and that, in his opinion, Bill was assaulted before he died.
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