Ostrowski to learn decision on bail Friday

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This article was published 15/12/2009 (5392 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

WINNIPEG – Frank Ostrowski will find out Friday whether he’ll get out of prison for Christmas after 23 years behind bars.

Ostrowski’s bail hearing is Friday at 9 a.m. in Court of Queen’s Bench, provincial justice officials said this morning.

The 60-year-old grandfather, convicted of a 1986 drug hit and sentenced to life behind bars, will find out Friday if he’ll be granted bail while Ottawa weighs whether he’s a victim of a wrongful conviction.

Ostrowski has maintained his innocence since the day he was arrested in connection with the murder of Robert Neiman.

James Lockyer of the Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted has argued there is considerable — if not overwhelming — evidence Ostrowski got a raw deal at his 1987 murder trial, in that important information was not disclosed by the Crown and police, specifically:

• a secret deal with a key witness Matthew Lovelace made with federal authorities to testify against Ostrowski in order to get a cocaine trafficking charge against him withdrawn so he wouldn’t go to jail; and
• a police report detailing a phone call to police in which a man, who identifies himself as Sonny, says, "Frank has a contract out on my friend." "Sonny" was later identified as Lovelace. In the call, Lovelace didn’t mention Nieman at all. He only referred to carpenter Dominic Diubaldo as the target.

Lockyer said the secret deal and Lovelace’s phone call should have been disclosed to the jury so they had a full picture of Lovelace’s credibility.