The prosecutor who agreed to let a police officer avoid jail time for killing a woman in a car crash told a public inquiry Tuesday he did the best he could with a flawed case.

Marty Minuk spent much of the day fending off accusations he was too eager to cut a deal that eventually created public outrage.

"I thought there were a number of problems with (the case),'' Minuk said. "There was not a slam dunk, so to speak.''

Minuk is normally a defence lawyer, but was brought in as a special prosecutor in the case of Derek Harvey-Zenk, an off-duty officer who killed Crystal Taman in a highway accident in February 2005 after he had partied all night with fellow members of the Winnipeg Police Service.

Manitoba relies on special prosecutors for cases against police officers, because regular Crown lawyers have a close working relationship with the police force.

Because of a lack of evidence, most notably the inability of any of the other officers to recall how much alcohol Harvey-Zenk had consumed, charges of impaired driving causing death, criminal negligence causing death and refusing a breathalyzer were dropped as part of a plea bargain.

Harvey-Zenk instead pleaded guilty to dangerous driving causing death and was sentenced to two years of house arrest.

The sentence prompted a public outcry which pressed the Manitoba government to call the inquiry.

Minuk said he realized early on he would have a hard time getting convictions on most of the charges.

"I did not think in any way that I could link alcohol to the cause of the (crash). I didn't think I was going to have any chance at all,'' he said.

Minuk pressed on stand

But inquiry counsel David Paciocco suggested Minuk was too quick to agree to a plea bargain without gathering evidence such as receipts from the restaurant where Harvey-Zenk and his fellow officers had started their all-night party.

"You entered into what I would identify as a plea bargain without the ... records,'' said Paciocco. "You also made that decision, sir, without interviewing a number of witnesses.''

"Fair enough,'' replied Minuk, who added he asked the police chief in East St. Paul four times for the restaurant receipts, but never got them. Minuk also suggested some witnesses would not have added much to the case.

Paciocco also pressed Minuk on why he agreed to a sentence of house arrest despite a Manitoba Justice policy which says such sentences are generally to be avoided in cases where someone has been killed or seriously injured.

Minuk said jail sentences in similar cases had been overturned by appeal courts.

"My assessment was made based on the case law, and I was not going to be arguing a case which was contrary to the decisions of the Manitoba Court of Appeal,'' Minuk replied.

The inquiry has already heard about several mistakes made in the crash investigation by police in East St. Paul, a Winnipeg bedroom community. Officers failed to interview some of the witnesses at the scene, including a tow-truck driver who reportedly told the victim's family that Harvey-Zenk smelled strongly of alcohol.

Police also didn't give Harvey-Zenk a sobriety test at the scene and never asked him whether he had been drinking. He was asked for a breath sample later at the police station.

East St. Paul police never interviewed the Winnipeg police officers who had been partying with Harvey-Zenk for several hours before the crash. They asked the professional standards unit at the Winnipeg force to conduct the interviews, and the officers said they had no idea how much Harvey-Zenk had consumed.

Family didn't support deal

While Minuk felt he had little choice but to cut a deal, the victim's family criticized him for not pressing ahead. Taman's father, Sveinn Sveinson, said Minuk appeared to be acting more as a defence lawyer than a prosecutor.

Paciocco asked Minuk whether his decision was influenced by his having acted as a defence lawyer for a police officer 15 years prior to the crash. Paciocco also wondered if another factor was that Minuk had recently worked alongside Harvey-Zenk's lawyer on another case.

"The suggestion that I would give another lawyer a break on a case for his client and ruin my legal career for that? Absolutely not,'' Minuk said.

"The allegations are so insulting, it's beyond belief.''

Taman's relatives have said the province should avoid hiring defence lawyers as prosecutors in police cases, and instead bring in Crown attorneys from other provinces. But a provincial review by retired judge Ruth Krindle defended the practice, saying it is common in other jurisdictions.