Early in the afternoon of November 3, 2004, Wyann Ruso took her husband’s unregistered shotgun to police at 42 Division in Scarborough. Giuseppe “Joe” Ruso had threatened to kill her over an affair he thought she was having with a co-worker. The police promised Wyann a quick arrest; however, when she arrived home at 4:45, concerned about the welfare of their severely disabled 29-year-old daughter, Joe was waiting. Though muttering threats, he managed to control his rage during dinner and a 6 p.m. walk through the neighbourhood with Wyann and their daughter in her wheelchair. Once back home, Joe cornered Wyann in the garage, demanding the phone number of the man she was seeing. When she refused, he exploded. Grabbing an axe in one hand and her hair in the other, he struck her repeatedly across her head and neck until she fell, bleeding and unconscious. Picking up a hammer, he smashed her face.

Miraculously, Wyann survived, and Joe later pleaded guilty to attempted murder. On this February morning in 2007, Wyann is to read a victim-impact statement in Courtroom 2-7 on University Avenue as Joe slumps, eyes downcast, in the prisoner’s box. Present as a spectator is Wyann’s lawyer, Peter Rosenthal. In October 2006, he negotiated for Wyann an undisclosed settlement from the Toronto Police Service by arguing that her injuries resulted from their delay in arresting Joe. Now Rosenthal sits on the edge of his seat like a nervous parent watching a frightened child perform in public for the first time, as Wyann, in a quavering voice, describes her life since the assault. Twice she “died” as medical teams fought to revive her. The bones of her face were so crushed a doctorand then, of course, there’s the emotional trauma: “I cannot begin to describe how it feels when your husband, someone who is supposed to love and protect you, turns against you in such a violent manner.”

When the judge impatiently stops Wyann halfway through her statement to complain that she is rambling, Rosenthal uses the recess to help her edit it. After the session, he whisks her away from a wall of advancing reporters into private chambers; later he brokers a deal allowing them to photograph her leaving the court in exchange for asking no questions. With his client safely ensconced in a car, he holds a mini–press conference. As Wyann tells me, eyes brimming with gratitude, “Peter didn’t have to be here this morning, but he came as my friend. When I wanted a lawyer, my co-workers at the postal station told me about Peter and he visited me in hospital. He’s the best, and I say that from my heart.”