Ex-judge Jacques Delisle's lawyer says new evidence can prove miscarriage of justice
Lawyer James Lockyer says new autopsy shows Nicole Rainville's fatal gunshot wound consistent with suicide
The lawyer for ex-judge Jacques Delisle, who is serving a life sentence since 2012 for the first-degree murder of his wife, has asked Federal Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould to order an official investigation into the case in the wake of new evidence.
Delisle was convicted for the shooting death of his wife, Nicole Rainville, after she was found in their Quebec City home lying on the couch with a bullet in her head on Nov. 12, 2009.
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James Lockyer, the Toronto lawyer who has helped exonerate more than 20 people wrongly convicted of serious crimes, says a new autopsy report shows the gun was pointed at an angle that is consistent with suicide.
Lockyer filed an application for a ministerial review of Delisle's conviction 15 months ago, when Peter MacKay was still federal justice minister.
Lockyer said this new evidence should convince the minister there has been a "likely miscarriage of justice."
"It seems to me that we now have a case of a man sitting in jail for a crime he didn't commit," Lockyer said.
This request for a ministerial review is the final recourse for Delisle, who has maintained his innocence since his wife's death.
Convicted prisoners in Canada who have lost all their legal appeals are allowed by law to ask the government to reopen the case by making a direct appeal to the federal justice minister.
If Raybould-Wilson finds there was enough evidence to grant an investigation, then Lockyer could request bail for Delisle pending the result of the review.
If successful, Delisle's case could be sent back to the Quebec Court of Appeal or a new trial could be set.
In an interview from behind bars with CBC's the fifth estate in 2015, Delisle said that when he was on trial, he hid from the court his real role in his disabled wife's death — helping her commit suicide.
The former Quebec Court of Appeal justice said he left a loaded gun for his wife to take her own life in November 2009 and tried to talk her out of it, but that he didn't kill her.
During the 2012 trial, the defence argued Rainville had taken her own life several years after a stroke that left her partially paralyzed.
Rainville had repeatedly mentioned taking her own life, according to Delisle and other family members.
With files from Catherine Tsalikis and Catou Mackinnon