The case, which has been more than two years in the making, consuming significant public resources in the process, is now dramatically weaker. Livingston and Miller, respectively McGuinty’s former chief of staff and deputy chief of staff, are pleading not guilty to three charges each. All relate to the alleged deliberate destruction of documents about the McGuinty government’s billion-dollar cancellation of gas plants in Oakville and Mississauga. Central to making that case was Robert Gagnon, a retired detective-sergeant from the Ontario Provincial Police and the force’s former e-crimes and forensic data expert. It remains unexplained why neither OPP lawyers nor prosecutors recognized the Supreme Court case as significant.

Source: National Post September 28, 2017 23:48 UTC