Parents Not Guilty Of Manslaughter In Methadone Death

A judge in Calgary has found two parents guilty of failing to provide the necessities of life after their 16-month-old daughter died of a methadone overdose in 2006.

Lisa Guerin and Jonathan Hope were acquitted of manslaughter and criminal negligence causing death.
Summer Hope died after consuming the powerful legal drug, which is used to treat addictions.

Court heard that her father told two officers he got his daily dose of methadone at a clinic, but spat a mouthful into a coffee cup and brought it home.

The Crown's key witness, a friend of Guerin's, testified that both parents saw Summer with an orange stain on her shirt and assumed she had ingested the drug.

But lawyers for both parents argued there was no evidence of either a coffee cup or stained clothing, and that neither knew how dangerous methadone could be.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• Lisa Guerin
• Jonathan Hope
• Summer Hope
• Amanda MacDonald
• Methadone
• Justice Earl Wilson