Achi news desk-
The daughter of a New Brunswick man who was recently acquitted of murder, remembers her father as someone who, despite a wrongful conviction, never became bitter or angry.
Walter Gillespie died last week aged 80.
“His only wish was that people would know for a fact that he did not commit that horrible crime,” said his daughter, who only wants to be known by her first name Patricia, in a statement. “He finally got that wish.”
In 1984, Gillespie and his friend Robert Mailman were wrongly convicted of the 1983 killing of George Leeman in St John. Gillespie spent 21 years in prison, and Mailman spent 18 years in prison. Both men received full parole in 2000.
A full exoneration of Gillespie and Mailman took place in January, with a judge apologizing for a “miscarriage of justice.”
An undisclosed financial settlement was reached between the two men and the provincial government in February.
Mailman has terminal lung cancer and has been told he only has a few months to live.
Gillespie’s daughter says her father died after an accidental fall at his home on Friday.
“My father was a kind man,” Patricia said in the statement. “He didn’t have a mean bone in his body. I have never heard him speak ill or disrespectfully of anyone. He kept to himself and never caused trouble or drama. He has touched my heart, seeing comments from people who knew him, saying that he was a good man and that he will be greatly missed.
“Life wasn’t fair to him, but he never let that turn him from being a kind soul to being a bitter or angry person. That’s saying a lot because, ‘unfair’ doesn’t even begin to cover what his life was.”
Gillespie’s daughter says a private memorial will be held at a later date.
In a CTV News interview, Innocence Canada co-president Ron Dalton says Gillespie’s exceptional integrity as a person is one of the things he will remember most about him.
“To me, he stands as a picture of a loyal friend and someone who was very committed to his principles,” Dalton said. “For 40 years he stood by his friend Mr Mailman, when he could have walked away from this situation. He refused to say that he had seen something he did not see, or heard something he did not hear. And he paid dearly, with his freedom for those 40 years.”
