Smith's conclusions led to false convictions in Ontario

There's no sign yet of any Nunavut link to the work of former Ontario pathologist Charles Smith, says the territory's chief coroner.

Tim Neily said he's looking through autopsy reports since 1999 to see if Smith might have worked on any of them. Because there are no facilities in Nunavut, the territory orders 25 to 30 autopsies per year, which are sent to labs in Toronto, Winnipeg and Edmonton.

"It's not a huge number, but it does mean going through each individual autopsy report," Neily said.

Smith was once regarded as Canada's top forensic child pathologist, performing nearly 1,000 autopsies in the 24 years he worked at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children. But the province of Ontario is conducting an inquiry into his work, after a coroner's study concluded Smith made questionable findings in 20 of 45 sample cases. Thirteen of those cases led to criminal charges.

Critics charged that Smith played the role of crusader, instead of dispassionate investigator, and sometimes saw crimes where there may have been only accidents.

William Mullins-Johnson of Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., served 12 years in prison after being convicted of the murder of his four-year-old niece, largely on the strength of evidence from Smith concluding the girl was raped and strangled.

Evidence later surfaced that Smith had lost tissue samples proving the girl died of natural causes. Ontario's attorney general now wants the federal justice minister to review the case.

If Smith worked on any Nunavut files, the coroner's office would then check to see if any criminal charges were laid in those cases, Neily said. But he added that just because a file might have Smith's name on it doesn't mean there were any problems with the autopsy.

"We ‘d have to look at all the circumstances around the death also and then go from there," he said.

The coroner's office in Yellowknife is also sifting through its files for connections to Smith, which could include cases from the Nunavut regions sent to Toronto before division from the Northwest Territories. But Neily doesn't think the Smith fiasco means Nunavut needs to examine its autopsy system.

"It's definitely a freak occurrence," he said. "All of our autopsies are done outside of Nunavut and actually I think at times it's for the better that they are, because we are able to have our autopsies done at some of the best facilities in the country."

With 25 to 30 autopsies originating in Nunavut every year, Neily said there simply isn't enough work for the territory to have a full time pathologist.

Last week, the province of Ontario announced that British Columbia senator and former Vancouver coroner Larry Campbell will chair an expert panel of scientists working on a public inquiry into Smith's work.