Sitter confesses to slaying
Friday, December 15
- Organization: Toronto Star
Final vindication for Brenda Waudby, wrongfully accused of daughter's death
PETERBOROUGH—Almost 10 years after her toddler was beaten to death, a mother originally charged with the murder heard the girl's babysitter finally confess to the crime.
Brenda Waudby sat in court holding the hand of her sobbing daughter, Justine Traynor, 17, who heard for the first time yesterday how her baby sister was killed.
Waudby was originally charged with second-degree murder in the death of her 21-month-old daughter, Jenna Mellor.
Jenna died early in the morning of Jan. 21, 1997, and her babysitter publicly admitted to the crime yesterday, pleading guilty to manslaughter.
The killer, who's now in his early twenties, can't be publicly identified as he was a minor when he poked and punched the toddler to death.
He is to be sentenced March 1.
The murder charge against Waudby was withdrawn two years after it was laid when medical experts disagreed with evidence provided by now-disgraced pathologist Dr. Charles Smith.
Waudby said she knows that some people in her community had branded her as a child killer.
"Now I guess it's just picking up the pieces and starting to heal," Waudby said outside the courthouse, after a long, tearful hug with her surviving daughter.
"Life now begins," she said. "I can actually let my daughter (Jenna) go. We've been through a lot."
Emotions ran high during the guilty plea and courthouse security officers had to separate members of the killer's and Waudby's families in the hallway, after the killer allegedly winked at them.
"To see him wink, that's just laughing at it all," said Waudby's brother, Tom Waudby.
"He winked, the little creep winked at me," Jenna's step-grandmother said outside court.
The former babysitter wasn't taken into custody, and left quickly after his supporters exchanged harsh words with Waudby's family.
The babysitter beat Jenna Mellor to death because he resented being told by his mother to baby-sit the toddler, court was told.
Court heard that the former babysitter told an undercover police officer he never told anyone before how he punched Jenna a half dozen times when she was in his care, and then jabbed her repeatedly with a finger.
"She wouldn't stay down so I hit her so she would stay down," the powerfully built former babysitter admitted to the undercover officer.
Waudby had pressed police for years that they should investigate the babysitter.
Police said at the time of the man's arrest that they had been helped by several agencies, including the FBI.
Waudby had high praise yesterday for Sgt. Larry Charmley of Peterborough police, who extracted a confession from the former babysitter during the undercover operation in November 2005.
The crown yesterday dropped two counts of sexual assault against the former babysitter, saying there wasn't enough evidence to proceed.
Waudby was originally charged after Smith placed her with Jenna at the time the fatal injuries occured, a conclusion later contradicted by others.
Waudby complained to the Ontario College of Physicians and Surgeons that Smith — who had kept a strand of pubic-like hair found in Jenna's pubic area in his office for five years until it was seized by police — had failed to conduct a standard rape kit test during the autopsy.
Smith's work came under scrutiny in the case of William Mullins-Johnson, who was released from prison last year pending a review by the federal justice minister, after serving almost 13 years of a first-degree murder sentence.
Smith was formally cautioned by the Ontario College of Physicians and Surgeons in 2002 after a panel of independent pathologists said they were "extremely disturbed" by deficiencies in his approach in three child-death cases.
The murder charge against Waudby was withdrawn on June 15, 1999, when prosecutor Brian Gilkinson cited "certain medical evidence that has shifted dramatically."
That evidence consisted of the conclusions of five medical experts, who, unlike Smith, stated that Jenna's injuries had been sustained on the evening of her death, at a time when the child was in another person's care.
An emergency ward doctor noted that Jenna sustained "rectal suffering," while an admission nurse wrote: "anal contusions and rectal tear noted."
A member of the Peterborough fire department who saw the baby's body wrote in a report: "possible sexual abuse."
Smith's name has been connected with several miscarriages of justice, including the case of Louise Reynolds of Kingston, who was accused in 1997 of killing her 7-year-old daughter.
That charge was dropped after independent experts found that the little girl had been mauled by a pit bull.
With files from Harold Levy
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