A Toronto couple convicted of beating to death their malnourished four-year-old son have had their murder convictions voided and are to face a new trial after the Ontario Court of Appeal ruled the judge in the case tainted the proceedings by urging the parents to plead guilty.
His parents, Ravyn Colley and Joel Roberto, who had been convicted by a jury of murder charges and were serving penitentiary terms, are now to face renewed proceedings, including those to determine whether they will be released. The lawyers for the couple launched renewed appeals after they received life sentences, which led to Wednesday’s appellate ruling.
Shortly after 2:30 am in October, 2014, Jaelin was found dead in his home. Court documents say the boy, just three months away from his fifth birthday, was discovered in a “manifestly emaciated” state, weighing less than he did as an 18-month-old toddler. He had bruises to his face, a laceration through his lower lip, a fractured wrist, and a traumatic brain injury that had left him unconscious.
This was when, according to the Court of Appeal, Justice Ducharme invited lawyers into his chambers for a 20-minute discussion, where he gave “his unsolicited views about the strength of the evidence, expressing that ‘juries do not like child killers’ and that the were ‘fucked’ if they proceeded to trial on first-degree murder.”