Ontario's court of appeal has declined to order that a 700-page report on the case of Stephen Truscott be made public.

An excerpt from the Toronto Star story:

A request by several media organizations to release a 700-page document that may shed light on the murder conviction of Steven Truscott was rejected by Ontario's top court yesterday.

The report, prepared by retired Quebec Court of Appeal justice Fred Kaufman for the federal government and now in the hands of the Ontario Court of Appeal, is subject to solicitor-client privilege and it's up to the justice minister to waive that privilege, the court concluded in its ruling.

Chief Justice Roy McMurtry, Justice David Doherty and Justice Michael Moldaver found that "there can be no doubt that (the report's) contents are a matter of public interest."

But, their decision says, "Without in any way detracting from this court's past jurisprudence emphasizing the importance of the freedom of the press ... any claim to access ... cannot justify access to material that is protected by solicitor and client privileges, absent waver of privilege."

The motion to make the report public was filed by the Toronto Star last month.

Truscott was convicted of murder at age 14 back in 1959 (the year I was born) and was sentenced to death -- a sentence later commuted to life in prison. Truscott served 10 years, but he has always maintained his innocence.

For the book-length version of his story, see Julien Sher's Until You Are Dead.