Ostrowski files $16-M wrongful conviction lawsuit

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This article was published 15/06/2020 (1557 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Nearly two years after Manitoba’s highest court added his name to the list of the province’s wrongfully convicted, Frank Ostrowski has filed a $16-million lawsuit against those he alleges played a role in sending him to prison for 23 years for a murder he says he didn’t commit.

Ostrowski, 70, was convicted in 1987 of orchestrating the drug-related shooting death of 22-year-old Robert Nieman and sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years.

In 2018, nine years after he was released on bail pending a federal review of his case, the Manitoba Court of Appeal stayed Ostrowski’s murder conviction — ruling an undisclosed prosecution deal with police informant Matthew Lovelace, in return for his testimony, resulted in a miscarriage of justice.

Also not disclosed to the defence were notes and a report from a Winnipeg Police Service officer, Sgt. N. Jacobson, who had a phone conversation with the informant a few hours before the slaying, during which Lovelace identified another man, not Nieman, as the target of a shooting.

A statement of claim filed Monday names 12 defendants, including the Attorney General of Canada, retired Manitoba judge Judith Webster, veteran defence lawyer Hymie Weinstein and former Winnipeg police chief Herb Stephen.

The lawsuit alleges the defendants “willfully disregarded” Ostrowski’s constitutional right to make full answer and defence to the charges against him.

“The conduct of the defendants was malicious, high-handed, outrageous, reckless, wanton, entirely without care, intentional,” alleges the lawsuit.

Reached by phone, Ostrowski declined to comment on the lawsuit, saying only, “It’s a long time coming,” before referring a reporter to his lawyer.

The senior prosecutor in the case was George Dangerfield, the same prosecutor tied to the wrongful convictions of Kyle Unger, James Driskell and Thomas Sophonow.

In 1986, Weinstein was representing Lovelace on drug trafficking charges when he made a deal with federal prosecutors to stay the charges if Lovelace testified against Ostrowski. At Ostrowski’s 2009 bail hearing, Weinstein testified he asked that no one tell Lovelace of the deal at the time, as it would “taint his evidence.”

At a hearing before the Manitoba Court of Appeal in 2017, Webster — a federal prosecutor in 1986 — testified she had “no memory” of the Ostrowski file, and said she did not know specific details of the deal with Lovelace.

Another then-federal prosecutor assigned to the case died one day after testifying before the Manitoba Court of Appeal in November 2016. An obituary notice in the Free Press makes no mention of the cause of death.

“The federal Crowns, Weinstein and (Jake) Haasbeek (a city police officer and defendant involved in Lovelace’s initial arrest) ignored that the Lovelace deal was ‘subject to confirmation with the provincial Crown,’” says the lawsuit. “The federal Crowns, Weinstein, and Haasbeek never advised or sought permission from the provincial Crowns about the Lovelace deal. They treated the Lovelace deal as if it was an unconditional three-party agreement.”

At Ostrowski’s trial, Dangerfield, who is not a named defendant, “presented Lovelace to the jury as reformed and having decide to get out of the criminal underworld and to live a legitimate lifestyle,” says the lawsuit. “According to Dangerfield, his motive for testifying was therefore purely altruistic.”

Ostrowski was convicted of trafficking in 1992, and sentenced to 15 years in prison. But for his murder conviction, he would have been eligible for day parole after serving 2 1/2 years, says the lawsuit.

The allegations have not been proven in court and no statements of defence have been filed.

dean.pritchard@freepress.mb.ca