Alberta prosecutors have maintained a murder position against a man who was imprisoned for more than three decades for the death of an Edmonton woman who disappeared in 1987.
In a press release on Friday, Innocence Canada, a non -profit organization that advocates unjust sentences, said the Alberta Crown Prosecutor’s Office (ACPS) has maintained the second degree murder position against Roy Sobotiak.
In an email to CBC on Friday, ACPS confirmed “that the matter stayed.”
Sobotiak, 61, spent more than 35 years after bars after being convicted of the murder of the 34 -year -old mother, Susan Kaminsky.
Kaminsky disappeared in February 1987 and his body was never found.
Sobotiak, who was just over 20 years old at that time, was the last person known to see Kaminsky Viva.
He was sentenced to life imprisonment without probation of probation for 16 and a half years in 1991. Since his conviction, he continued to insist on his innocence and has never been granted probation.
In May 1994, Alberta Court of Appeals dismissed Sobotiak’s appeal against his conviction, and his license application to appeal before the Supreme Court of Canada was dismissed in 2004.
In February 2021, Sobotiak asked the Federal Minister of Justice for a review of his conviction.
According to the Criminal Code, a person who has been convicted of a crime and who has exhausted all the rights of appeal can request the Federal Minister of Justice for a review of his conviction.
Sobotiak received a new trial in February by the former Federal Minister of Justice, Arif Virani, who concluded that there were reasonable reasons to believe that a “spontaneous abortion of justice” had occurred in the case.
An informative note of the Lebotiak legal team declared that the ministerial review depended on three key issues: the undercover police operation, the investigation details not revealed and the additional forensic evidence linked to the case, some of which were discovered after their conviction.
In response, Alberta Attorney General Mickey Amery requested a judicial review to dispute the decision.
With his annulled prior murder sentence, Sobotiak was legally innocent and the bond was granted in May.
Sobotiak was released in a sober life house in Fort McMurray and was subject to conditions that include a curfew and electronic monitoring for three months.
Innocence Canada’s statement declared that Sobotiak was scheduled to appear before the court in Edmonton on Friday morning to establish a date for his new trial. However, Alberta prosecutors entered a suspension of the procedures, effectively ending the case against Sobotiak.
“Mr. Sobotiak is a free man without restrictions on him for the first time since the day of his arrest in 1989,” said Innocence Canada.
“Roy Sobotiak spent more time in prison than any other person unjustly convicted in Canada to date,” said James Lockyer, founding director of Innocence Canada and one of Sobotiak’s lawyers, in an interview with CBC News.
In the press release, Innocence Canada said that Sobotiak intends to continue staying in the arrogance Living House for now.
