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	Crown's Decision Ultimately Backfired Standard-Freeholder February 25, 2009 http://www.standard-freeholder.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=1450270 Lawyers for the Ministry of the Attorney General's office defended the decision by one of their crown attorneys to proceed with one trial against an alleged sexual predator. Leslie McIntosh told the Cornwall Public Inquiry that joining together all of the charges against Rev. Charles MacDonald would have both improved the merits of the case and made it easier on both MacDonald and his victims. "There should not be two identical trials: one where the first set of victims would testify with the second set giving similar-fact evidence, and then a second trial where the second set of victims would be the complainant," said McIntosh. "That would be not be viewed to be in the interest of either the victims of the accused." At the time MacDonald was set to go to trial, he was facing charges that he had sexually abused eight boys. The decision to join the charges together backfired: MacDonald's attorneys were able to successfully argue the retired priest's rights to a trial within a reasonable amount of time had been violated. In 2002, a judge stayed all the charges. The Attorney General's office was one of four parties which delivered their final submissions yesterday.
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