![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/70c8fc80.png\")
<\/p>\nOntario\u2019s attorney general will neither condemn nor support Premier Doug Ford\u2019s suggestion that a provincial judge should apologize for her instructions to the jury in the trial of Umar Zameer.<\/p>\n
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The high-profile case saw Zameer acquitted of first-degree murder in the death of Det. Const. Jeffrey Northrup, a plainclothes officer who was fatally run over in downtown Toronto in the summer of 2021.<\/p>\n
During the case, the judge called into question the testimony of three central witnesses \u2014 all Toronto police detectives \u2014 in the Crown\u2019s argument, suggesting they lied and colluded.<\/p>\n
Then, last month, an Ontario Provincial Police investigation into the allegation cleared the Toronto officers<\/a>. It was a conclusion Zameer\u2019s lawyer vehemently contested<\/a>.<\/p>\n After the investigation was published, both the Toronto police union president and Premier Ford said the judge should apologize for suggesting the officers had lied.<\/p>\n Story continues below advertisement<\/p>\n Ford, specifically, said the veteran judge \u201cshould apologize for accusing (the officers) of everything under the sun.\u201d<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\tGet daily National news<\/p>\n Get daily Canada news delivered to your inbox so you’ll never miss the day’s top stories.<\/p>\n The comments came before MPPs returned to the legislature. Now, roughly two weeks later, Attorney General Doug Downey, who serves in Ford\u2019s cabinet and oversees the judicial system, refused to be drawn on the issue.<\/p>\n Asked if the premier should have weighed into the issue, Downey said he was \u201cnot commenting on that.\u201d<\/p>\n The province\u2019s top lawyer also declined to say if the judge should apologize or if he had received complaints from legal groups.<\/p>\n \u201cIt sounds like a line of questioning that I\u2019m not commenting on,\u201d Downey responded when asked if the premier\u2019s comments had made his job harder.<\/p>\n Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles said the premier was putting his attorney general in a difficult position by weighing in on judicial decisions and process.<\/p>\n \u201cIt means the attorney general is stuck, once again, picking up the pieces for a premier who\u2019s out of control,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s what this government is always doing, right? Protect the king at all costs.\u201d<\/p>\n The calls for the judge to apologize elicited a rare rebuke from Ontario\u2019s chief justice, who said an independent judiciary is a \u201ccornerstone of our constitutional democracy\u201d in a statement.<\/p>\n Story continues below advertisement<\/p>\n \u201cIt would be inappropriate and unethical for judges to succumb to outside pressure to modify or qualify their decisions or reasons,\u201d the chief justice wrote in a March 19 statement.<\/p>\n The Federation of Ontario Law Associations was among the legal organizations to issue a similar statement, pointing directly to Ford and the police union president\u2019s calls for an apology.<\/p>\n \u201cThese statements are appalling and an inappropriate attack on judicial independence. These statements are an unconcealed attempt to subvert the justice system,\u201d the group said.<\/p>\n Ontario Liberal interim leader John Fraser said the premier\u2019s demand was wrong, and that the attorney general didn\u2019t defend it because he may also be uncomfortable with the intervention.<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s the top lawmaker in Ontario; he knows it\u2019s wrong. He knows it\u2019s wrong,\u201d he said. \u201cHis boss shouldn\u2019t have said that\u2026 It was wrong. The attorney general knows that.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\t\t© 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ontario\u2019s attorney general will neither condemn nor support Premier Doug Ford\u2019s suggestion that a provincial judge should apologize…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":577283,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[49,48,13743,13403,44,13404,714,221408],"class_list":{"0":"post-577282","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-canada","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-doug-ford","11":"tag-ford-government","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-ontario-politics","14":"tag-politics","15":"tag-umar-zameer"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/577282","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=577282"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/577282\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/577283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=577282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=577282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=577282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Get](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/1767930311_275_national.jpg\")
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