Judge orders eye care for accused

Jail officials need to make sure accused murderer Douglas Hales gets to see an optometrist, a Saskatoon judge has ordered.

Justice Gerald Allbright issued the order Thursday in Saskatoon Court of Queen’s Bench after Hales’s lawyer brought an application for a stay of proceedings on the first-degree murder charge, arguing Hales’s right to a fair trial was being violated.

Hales, 35, is accused of killing Daleen Bosse, a 26-year-old university student who went missing in May 2004.

He was charged with first-degree murder after Bosse’s remains were found in a secluded area outside Saskatoon in August 2008, and he has been on remand at the Saskatoon Correctional Centre since then.

Allbright said he wondered why Thursday’s hearing was even necessary.

“I’m having a bit of a problem understanding why we’re having a problem,” he said.

The defence called one witness at the hearing, Kerry Lafreniere, the Saskatoon Correctional Centre employee who supervises the long-term remand unit. Lafreniere said Hales last saw an optometrist in July 2012 but was “dissatisfied” with his glasses and then the optometrist withdrew his services from the jail.

Allbright directed Saskatoon Correctional Centre authorities to try to get another optometrist to come to the jail to examine Hales or take him to see an optometrist.

Hales’s trial is scheduled for May 2014.