David Milgaard and Ron Dalton have dedicated themselves to fighting for judicial reforms. Now three of Canada’s federal parties are endorsing their bid for the establishment of an independent body to review potential wrongful convictions, says an advocacy group devoted to clearing the names of those who have been unjustly imprisoned.

Getting support from the Liberal, NDP and Green parties during a federal election campaign is a coup for Milgaard, 67, and Dalton, 63, who fought for years to have their respective murder convictions quashed and are now devoted to getting the same result for others. The Conservative Party and the Bloc Québécois have yet to respond.

“History has shown that the current system in Canada is incapable of expeditiously reversing wrongful convictions in a manner that is fair, timely and just for innocent people in prison,” Milgaard said during a news conference at the downtown Toronto offices of advocacy group Innocence Canada, formerly the Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted.

“Canada’s independent review board must remain completely independent from Canada’s criminal justice system, ” said Milgaard.

Milgaard spent 23 years in prison, while Dalton sat behind bars for more than eight years, for murders they didn’t commit. In Milgaard’s case, DNA evidence cleared his name and helped convict another man, Larry Fisher.

Currently, the federal justice minister decides whose convictions will be reviewed.

“This is big day when three of the major political parties are getting on board, not just what we’ve been begging for, for 26 years, but what’s been recommended by half a dozen public inquires (including the Milgaard inquiry),” Dalton said.

Dalton, a copresident of Innocence Canada and lawyer James Lockyer say reforms of what they deem a biased and antiquated review process, would see an arms-length panel of former judges, lawyers, prosecutors and civilians replace the current system where all applications have to be reviewed and validated by the federal minister of justice before it can be referred back to the courts.

Calling the parties’ policy positions a “huge breakthrough,” Lockyer said in order to have a fair process, it should be “independent of government to review claims of wrongful convictions.”

Lockyer pointed to England and Scotland, where such tribunals were established in 1997, and a combined 807 (more than 600 were quashed) have been referred back to the courts for review. Only 27 were sent back to the courts in Canada over the same time frame.

Correction - Oct. 10, 2019: This article was edited from a previous version that mistakenly said James Lockyer is a copresident of Innocence Canada.

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