NCJ Number
152050
Editor(s)
J Mannette
Date Published
1992
Length
123 pages
Annotation
Five essays review the work and findings of Nova Scotia's Royal Commission on the Donald Marshall, Jr. Prosecution, which investigated the criminal justice system's wrongful conviction and imprisonment of Donald Marshall, Jr., a member of the tribe of Mi'kmaq of the Nova Scotia Indians.
Abstract
The first essay reviews the Marshall case, which involved the wrongful arrest, conviction, and imprisonment of Marshall for a murder he did not commit; he was in prison for 11 years before his release and subsequent acquittal at retrial. This essay identifies how and why this happened, followed by an analysis of the establishment and work of the Marshall Commission. The author concludes that the injustice against Marshall resulted from the incompetence of police, lawyers, judges, and other officials of the justice system in Sydney in 1971, mixed with the bigotry and racial stereotyping typical of the time. In examining the legal consciousness in the Marshall inquiry, the second essay considers the Indian in race consciousness; the Mi'kmaq as Indians; race consciousness in Sydney, Nova Scotia; the history of immigrant thought about Indians; Mi'kmaq legal status; and the Mi'kmaq and the Crown. The third essay discusses the social construction of ethnic containment as revealed in the work of the Marshall Commission, followed by an essay that examines the Marshall case from a human rights perspective. The concluding essay looks beyond the Marshall inquiry to an alternative Mi'kmaq worldview and justice system. Chapter references and notes