Erland Mordue back in jail
By Jane Sims - Sun Media
Woodstock S-R
19 Sept 2006
WAS RELEASED INTO DAUGHTERS’ CUSTODY IN FEBRUARY
The Woodstock Sentinel-Review — Ontario's highest court overturned a decision to grant bail to a Woodstock man charged with first-degree murder in the death of his estranged wife. With two months to go before his trial, Erland Mordue, 58, turned himself in to Oxford Community Police on Saturday.
The Ontario Court of Appeal ruled his detention was “necessary to maintain public confidence in the way justice is administered.”
He is to go to trial on Nov. 14 in Woodstock.
He was charged after Woodstock hospital worker Lois Mordue, 59, was found stabbed to death in her one-storey home at 17 Wendy Calder Place Aug. 8, 2005.
The neighbourhood was described by one resident at the time of her death as “the perfect street.”
Erland Mordue, a truck driver, had been in custody until his Feb. 10 bail hearing before Superior Court Justice John McGarry.
Evidence at that hearing and his preliminary hearing in the Ontario Court of Justice in May is subject to a court-ordered publication ban.
He was released on a recognizance of $125,000 with his three daughters acting as sureties. He was ordered to live with one of the daughters and to be supervised at all times.
The appeals court disagreed with McGarry’s decision to dismiss the Crown’s argument that detention was required to maintain confidence in the administration of justice.
“To deny the accused bail would be tantamount to ruling that no person would be entitled to bail if he is charged with first-degree murder and there is a strong case to be brought by the Crown,” McGarry said.
McGarry said Erland Mordue’s release, especially with regards to public safety, was possible with the appropriate conditions. But the appeals court said McGarry should have focused more on the case at hand, not a general view of bail for accused murderers. And, the court said, the judge took “an unduly limited approach to the issue of public confidence.
“The proper focus of his inquiry was whether bail was to be granted or refused in the circumstances of the individual case before him,” the appeals court said. It added the judge should have assessed factors that would address public confidence in the justice system: the gravity of the offence; the strength of the Crown’s case; and the circumstances surrounding the offence - namely the issue of domestic violence.
“A reasonable member of the community would rightly be concerned with the public’s confidence in how the justice system responds to acts of domestic violence if the respondent was granted bail,” the appeals court wrote.
Lois Mordue’s brother, Robert Alexander said his family was “thrilled” with the appeals court’s decision.
- London Free Press
Publisher: Pat Logan
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