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Asper fought 'war': Milgaard's liberty was up against reputationsof 'bad guys'
ex-lawyer
Betty Ann Adam, The StarPhoenix, Thursday, February 23, 2006
David Milgaard's former lawyer, David Asper, felt he was fighting a "war of liberation" and his enemies were the people who had put Milgaard in prison and those who kept him there.
Asper represented Milgaard from 1986 until just after the Supreme Court of Canada set aside his conviction in 1992.
By then, Milgaard had spent 23 years in prison for the murder of 20-year-old Gail Miller, who had been raped and stabbed to death. DNA evidence proved Milgaard's innocence in 1997 and helped convict serial rapist Larry Fisher in 1999.
Asper said Wednesday it is regrettable that the system placed Milgaard's lawyers in a position where they fought with no rules, other than those which govern lawyers generally, and had to place Milgaard's right to liberty ahead of the reputations of those who had put him in prison and kept him there.
". . . Measured against other interests, I think we came to the conclusion that the liberty interest prevails," Asper said. "If there was damaging information about someone else, about a reputation, for example, that became subrogated to the interest of liberty. (continued on next photo)