KALEIGH’S BIG DAY
CHECK IT OUT
Nine-year-old who has spent most
of her life at Sick Kids celebrates
her Nova Scotia homecoming, A2
One of Toronto’s Little Free Library
stewards explains the program
that’s become a phenomenon, GT1
WEATHER HIGH – 1 C | SUN AND CLOUDS | MAP S12
MONDAY, DECEMBER 29, 2014
‘THIS IS MY WORST
NIGHTMARE’
Families anxiously await word on missing AirAsia Flight 8501
as Malaysia grapples with its third major air disaster in a year
BERNARD WEIL/TORONTO STAR
Edward Greenspan’s family leaves his funeral service Sunday.
Remembering
the life, laughs
of a legal lion
More than 800 gather for funeral of
criminal lawyer Edward Greenspan
BETSY POWELL
STAFF REPORTER
TRISNADI/THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
THOMAS FULLER
THE NEW YORK TIMES
JAKARTA, INDONESIA—The
head of the Indonesian
agency searching for a missing AirAsia jet carrying 162
people said Monday that he believed the aircraft was
“at the bottom of the sea” and warned that the country lacked adequate equipment to conduct an underwater search.
“The capability of our equipment is not optimum,”
Bambang Soelistyo, the head of Indonesia’s National
Search and Rescue Agency, said at a news conference.
Malaysia, Singapore and Australia joined the searchand-rescue operation, an effort that evoked a distressingly familiar mix of grief and mystery nine months
after a Malaysia Airlines jetliner disappeared over the Indian Ocean.
The Airbus A320-200, operated by the
Indonesian affiliate of AirAsia, a regional
budget carrier based in Malaysia, lost
contact with ground controllers off the
coast of Borneo on Sunday morning.
Tony Fernandes, the Malaysian businessman who in 2001 founded AirAsia, a
budget airline with an excellent safety
record to date, sent out a tweet Sunday:
“This is my worst nightmare.”
Relatives of the
passengers of
AirAsia Flight
8501 comfort
each other
at Juanda
International
Airport in
Surabaya,
Indonesia,
on Sunday.
MISSING FLIGHT continued on A12
A harrowing arrival, a happy ending
Baby’s breech delivery at roadside
‘scariest day of my life,’ dad says
KATRINA CLARKE
STAFF REPORTER
Ayden Connor Rorke is truly a miracle
baby.
His parents knew his birth would be
risky — Ayden was breech and his mother
was scheduled for a C-section — but they
didn’t expect to be delivering him on the
side of a road, with no heartbeat and the
umbilical cord wrapped around his neck.
“It was the scariest day of my life,” said
dad Ryan Rorke, 33.
Today, Ayden is a happy, healthy baby
boy adjusting to life at home in Alcona,
near Barrie — but his dad can’t stop
thinking about their terrifying Christmas
Eve ordeal.
The day had started off with excitement
at 5 a.m. when Ryan’s wife, Sarah, realized
her water had broken.
She woke Ryan up, took a shower and
got ready to leave for the hospital. The
in-laws arrived to take care of the couple’s
4-year-old son Lyam, and by 5:50 a.m. the
two were en route to Barrie’s Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre to welcome
their Christmas baby.
But suddenly, Sarah’s contractions began coming quickly and close together.
Ten minutes into their foggy drive on
Highway 400, she turned to her husband
and said, “You have to pull over. He’s
coming,” Ryan told the Star.
Ryan called 911, turned at the Dunlop St.
exit in Barrie and parked on the side of
the road near a Tim Hortons.
BABY AYDEN continued on A16
FAMILY PHOTO
Ryan and Sarah Rorke, baby Ayden
and Lyam, 4, are all healthy after
Ayden’s roadside birth on Dec. 24.
Since his sudden death last week, Edward
Greenspan has been remembered for his
forceful advocacy, his devotion to the justice system and for a legacy of inspiring
past and future generations of criminal
lawyers.
On Sunday, those closest to Greenspan
eulogized the legal giant with a mix of
heartfelt and humorous anecdotes at a
funeral packed with 800 mourners that
included many judges, Crown attorneys,
defence colleagues and clients.
Greenspan died of heart failure in his
sleep Christmas Eve hours after family
members ate dinner together at their vacation home in Phoenix, Ariz. He was 70.
Along with a who’s who of the legal
profession, prominent Torontonians in
attendance included filmmaker David
Cronenberg, former Toronto mayor Mel
Lastman, Blue Jays’ president and CEO
Paul Beeston, and longtime friend and
co-author George Jonas.
OR0
JULIANNA
GREENSPAN
ON HER FATHER’S
REQUIREMENTS
FOR HIS EULOGY
GREENSPAN continued on A3
‘High error rate’ plagues
immigration processing
NICHOLAS KEUNG
IMMIGRATION REPORTER
Internal government reviews found a
“high error rate” in immigration processing, from permanent resident applications
to refugee work permits, prompting fears
about the system’s integrity.
The human errors — staff failing to use
correct form letters, address missing documents and provide accurate timelines —
could not only cost individual applicants
a chance to live and work in Canada but
affect the “efficiency of the system” and
create unnecessary backlogs.
“An important area of concerns resides
with the letters. The number of request
letters not sent, sent incomplete or unclear at initial stage and later on create a
negative impact on both clients and the
Case Processing Centre (in Vegreville,
Alta.),” read one evaluation.
IMMIGRATION continued on A16
The year in parenting Even President Obama struggles with his kids, E6 Florida meltdown Back from break, Leafs lose to Panthers, S1
áFULL INDEX FOR MONDAY PAGE A2
“He gave me an
order: ‘When I
die you must
be funny, very
funny, no
sentimental
bull---t.’ ”
Internal
government
reviews find
immigration
department
employees
often fail
to use correct
form letters
or provide
accurate
timelines