Tammy Marquardt said she was pregnant with her youngest son when she first went behind bars.
Marquadt, of Anishinaabe descent, was born in Toronto. As a teenager, she suffered sexual abuse at the hands of her mother’s boyfriend and ended up leaving home when she was 17 years old. Two years later, she had her son Kenneth, who suffered from a number of serious health issues, including epilepsy. She ended up in an abusive relationship and living in poverty, something many women behind bars know only too well.
On Oct. 9th, 1993, Marquardt went to check on Kenneth, who was two-and-a-half years old, and found him gasping for air. Having an anxiety attack, she called 911 and couldn’t calm down enough to perform CPR. Kenneth was taken to hospital, but he had suffered brain damage and three days later, he was taken off life support and died.
Kenneth’s autopsy went to Dr. Charles Smith, who was the Director of the Ontario Pediatric Forensic Pathology Unit at SickKids Hospital in Toronto. Smith said the death was not accidental and two months later, Marquardt was charged and arrested for the second degree murder of her son.
Although Marquardt had always maintained her innocence, in 1995 she was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of Parole for 10 years.
In 2012, Marquardt was ordered a new trial (after Smith’s findings were called illogical and against scientific evidence-based reasoning, and disgraced). After almost 14 years in prison, she was released and exonerated.
Marquardt said during her time in prison, she didn’t have easy access to health care; but worse, her children on the outside were put in permanent care, and even once free, she wasn’t allowed access to them. The past conviction, although overturned, continues to come up in her file, as she fights to get her children back.