Robert Latimer

March 22/2007

To Federal Justice Minister Robert Nicholson
As Canada's new Justice Minister I would like to get your understanding of just what is the identity of the "more effective pain medication" the Supreme Court of Canada cites on Line 659 of it's January 18/2001 decision to imprison me for life:

"The appellant might have done so by using a feeding tube to improve her health and allow her to take more effective pain medication", or he might have relied on the group home that Tracy stayed at just before her death. The appellant may well have thought the prospect of struggling on unbearably sad and demanding. It was a human response that this alternative was unappealing. But it was a reasonable legal alternative that the law requires a person to pursue before he can claim the defence of necessity. The appellant was aware of this alternative but rejected it."

It is obvious from reading this paragraph that we were required by Canadian law to medicate our daughter with the "legal alternative", and we do not know what it is, or was.

I, and my wife knew of no such medication, and were told by the orthopedic surgeon that was proposing the surgery that Tracy would be on regular strength liquid Tylenol to control the pain which would result from the proposed operation. An operation to remove the top 1/4th of her femur, the largest bone in the body, and leave her leg dangling as a flail joint.

You may not be aware of our situation, as it has been over thirteen years since I was arrested in 1993. I was tried, and retried, with all of the many levels of appeals having been heard, with the last appeal resulting in the Supreme Court of Canada's January 18/2001 decision which resulted in my being sentenced to life in prison.

It was clear that the Court did not understand the evidence before it, and did not care enough to get "a realistic appreciation" of our situation. And when I write as I have since June 2001 to ask for an identity of what the Court was describing as "a more effective pain medication", or "better pain management" the Supreme Court has no interest in being honest with me.

It is my hope that you as Canada's new Justice Minister can tell me exactly what the identity of the "more effective medication" or "better pain medication" the Court cites so frequently in it's January 18/2001 decision is.

I have enclosed material I have put together in the past to help get justice through truth.