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[This edited version of the report has been prepared by Dr Robert N Moles]

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On 24 June 2008 the Globe and Mail reported “Why do the innocent plead guilty?”

The answer is simple for Anthony Hanemaayer, convicted in 1989 of a knifepoint sex attack that serial killer Paul Bernardo has now confessed to perpetrating.

Mr. Hanemaayer, whose case will be reviewed Wednesday by the Ontario Court of Appeal, says he succumbed to his fear of being convicted and given a heavy prison sentence. In return for pleading guilty, he was given a sentence of two years less a day.

It is an example of what defence lawyer John Struthers has called the "gross inequality" in an accused person's bargaining position.

Mr. Struthers told an Ontario inquiry earlier this year that the justice system is so stacked against the criminally accused, defence lawyers watch helplessly as clients who are likely innocent plead guilty to avoid a trial, especially if they face testimony by an expert.

What do you want to know about wrongful convictions? What questions do you have about Canada's justice system? Do you trust the system? Should it be fixed?

Joanne McLean, a founding director of the Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted, will join us online Wednesday at 3 p.m. ET.

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