TORONTO - Romeo Phillion's defence lawyer said Thursday he's "disturbed" that Crown lawyers withheld evidence 25 years ago which could have cleared his client of the 1967 murder of Ottawa firefighter Leopold Roy.

"I feel a little bit saddened and disturbed," an impassioned Arthur Cogan told the Ontario Court of Appeal on the final day of Phillion's four-day hearing.

Cogan said he didn't learn that Crown prosecutor Malcolm Lindsay had kept him in the dark about the evidence - which provides Phillion with an alibi for where he was when Roy was stabbed - until this week.

"Romeo didn't have a real, fair trial."

The evidence in question is a police report dated April 12, 1968, which cleared Phillion of the crime, stating, "We do not belive that Romeo Phillion is responsible for this murder."

By the time of Phillion's trial in January 1972, however, that report had disappeared, along with physical evidence which placed the accused in Trenton, Ont., several hours away from the scene of the crime, at the time of the murder.

The court is probing allegations that police and the Crown prosecutor conspired to frame Phillion.

Prior to the trial, Phillion confessed to the murder while in police custody - a confession he quickly recanted.

Cogan tried to explain the confession by telling the court that Phillion had been a "bizarre" client who was prone to irrational behaviour, even swallowing razor blades and fishing hooks while in police custody.

"He was very mixed up."

Cogan then said Phillion made the confession in an effort to get a man who was his gay lover at the time released from police custody.

During Cogan's testimony, the grey-haired, rail-thin Phillion leaned forward and watched intensely.

Phillion told police, "'I'll tell you something big if you let my boyfriend go,"' Cogan told the court.

On Wednesday, Malcolm Lindsay - the Crown lawyer who prosecuted the case in 1972 - admitted his office had been in possession of the alibi report, but said he wasn't aware of it at the time.