A Toronto mother who was convicted and later acquitted of murder in the death of her disabled daughter after four years in prison has filed a multimillion dollar lawsuit, alleging police were negligent in their investigation and caused her to be falsely imprisoned.
Cindy Ali and her husband Allan are seeking more than $10 million in damages, according to a statement of claim filed at the Ontario Superior Court of Justice in August.
The lawsuit, first reported on by the Toronto Star, names as defendants the Toronto Police Service Board, the City of Toronto, the lead investigator in Ali’s teenage daughter’s death and a firefighter who testified at both her trials.
The claim argues the defendants were negligent and failed to meet a duty of care they owed the couple following the February 2011 death of their 16-year-old daughter Cynara, who had cerebral palsy and was unable to walk, talk or feed herself.
The allegations haven’t been proven in court and none of the defendants have filed a statement of defence. The city and police board both declined to comment while the matter is before the courts.
Ali was originally found guilty of first-degree murder at a jury trial in 2016 and sentenced to life in prison. She successfully appealed that conviction in 2021 and was granted a new trial, in which she was found not guilty earlier this year.
The claim alleges Toronto police’s lead investigator in the death dismissed without proper investigation Cindy Ali’s version of events — that two masked men broke into her family’s Scarborough home on the day Cynara was found without vital signs.
Police didn’t believe home invasion story: lawsuit
At her first trial, Ali testified one of the men had a gun and made her take him through various rooms in the house in search of a mysterious package, which they never found. Meanwhile, Cynara lay on the living room couch with the other man nearby, Ali said.
At one point, when she broke away from the man with the gun and ran to the living room, Ali testified she saw the second man with a pillow in his hand, standing by Cynara, who wasn’t moving and was “very quiet” and pale.
Ali said the two men then left after announcing they had the wrong residence. She said she called 911 after shaking her daughter and finding her unresponsive.
Cynara was pulled off life support at a Toronto hospital two days later.
Cindy Ali, a Toronto woman who was previously found guilty in the death of her daughter, has been acquitted in a second trial.
Instead of believing Cindy, the detective quickly developed the working theory that she had “fabricated” the home invasion story as a way to “cover up” her role in Cynara’s death, according to the claim.
“The investigation into the home invasion was conducted to discredit its occurrence,” the claim alleges. “Officers took little care to secure the scene in the hours following the event, and the forensic team neglected to take fingerprint or DNA samples from several surfaces that Cindy said the home invaders touched.”
During the course of the investigation, police searched the family’s home, surveilled their family members, and intercepted phone communications. Police also came up with an elaborate scheme to convince the family they won a fake contest — the prize being an all-expenses paid trip to Niagara Falls — so police could install “probes” while their home was empty that allowed them to monitor all communication inside, according to the claim.
However, the claim states these efforts failed to produce any incriminating evidence.
“None of the months’ worth of surveillance, phone intercepts, or in-home probes were produced as evidence against Cindy at her 2023 retrial,” it reads.
Firefighter’s testimony false, lawsuit alleges
The claim says the firefighter, who was the first emergency responder to arrive at the Ali home, testified at both trials that upon arriving at the home snow had accumulated on the doorstep and there were no footprints in the snow, bolstering the prosecution’s case.
“This evidence suggested that Cindy’s report of a home invasion, in the absence of footprints in the snow, had to be false,” the claim says.
The Alis allege the firefighter abused his position of power by “falsely” claiming there were no footprints in the snow, and that, as his employer, the city is also liable for his actions.
While imprisoned in Kitchener, Cindy attempted suicide twice, according to the suit. In addition to her loss of liberty while in prison, both she and her husband endured psychological and emotional trauma and an inability to grieve Cynara’s death, they state in the claim.