Jury Begins Deliberations in Stephan Trial

LETHBRIDGE – Jury deliberations are underway in the trial of David and Collet Stephan, the couple charged in connection with the death of their 18-month old son Ezekiel.

The toddler stopped breathing on the night of March 13, 2012, and died several days later in hospital.

The defence case has focused on rejecting the medical examiner’s official cause of death for Ezekiel, which is listed as bacterial meningitis. Based on testimony from their expert witness, they say the child had viral meningitis, and that he could have been saved if the ambulance sent to rescue him had been properly equipped to open his airway.

Going off the medical examiner’s report and testimony from the doctors who encountered Ezekiel at the Alberta Children’s Hospital in Calgary, the Crown says that because of swelling on Ezekiel’s brain, caused by bacterial meningitis, he was dead before even got to the ambulance. They concluded that one trip to the doctor over the course of about two weeks would have been enough to save him.