The handling of the Rebecca Middleton murder case was criticised in a documentary beamed out across Canada on Sunday.

A CBC video journalist followed Dave Middleton, the father of the slain Canadian teen, as he went through a recent judicial review aiming to get fresh charges against two suspects. Entitled ‘Seeking Justice in Bermuda’, the broadcast, which reached an estimated 500,000 to 800,000 viewers, depicted Mr. Middleton’s heartache when the bid failed.

No one has ever been convicted of the rape and murder of 17-year-old Rebecca, from Belleville, Ontario, who was on holiday in Bermuda when she was killed in 1996. On Friday, Chief Justice Richard Ground rejected an application from British human rights lawyer Cherie Booth — acting for Mr. Middleton — that Kirk Mundy, 31, and Justis Smith, 28, should face fresh charges of serious sexual assault, torture, and kidnap because murder proceedings against them were botched.

Mundy and Smith were arrested days after the killing, with Mundy claiming to have had consensual sex with Rebecca. He said he found Smith killing her when he returned from washing himself in the sea. Before Police completed forensic tests, prosecutors accepted Mundy’s guilty plea of accessory after the fact — meaning he knew a crime had been committed and assisted or sheltered the offender — while Smith was charged with premeditated murder.

However, Smith’s murder trial was thrown out by a judge.

The current Director of Public Prosecutions, Vinette Graham-Allen, acknowledged during the judicial review that Mundy should never have been allowed to plead to the lesser accessory charge, and Smith’s trial should not have been halted.

However, she argued that the law does not allow the case to be re-opened at this stage, and Mr. Justice Ground upheld this in his ruling on Friday.

CBC documentary-maker Peter Wall showed Mr. Middleton’s frustration that no one has ever been brought to justice for his daughter’s murder.

“When the whole thing fell apart, they basically washed their hands of it and said there was nothing more than we can do,” he said of those working in Bermuda’s judicial system at the time. “It’s like a lot of things in life — it’s not the problems you have but how you handle them, and I don’t think this problem has been handled very well at all in Bermuda.”

Mr. Middleton plans to appeal against the decision of the Chief Justice in the Court of Appeal. CBC news host Carole MacNeil revealed that this could cost Mr. Middleton an additional $150,000 on top of the $100,000 legal bill he already faces for the judicial review.

The programme is available for viewing online at www.cbc.ca/sunday.