EDMONTON - Lesley Miller burst into tears when she was told the man who beat her husband into a vegetative state has been granted a new trial by the Supreme Court, partly because the trial judge took too long to submit his written ruling.

Miller can't believe Leo Teskey is getting another chance to plead his case when she and her husband can't properly celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary Friday.

"Now Dougald just lies there and can't even say hello to me," Miller said after Thursday's ruling. "And ... this criminal, for want of a better word, (has) a new trial. I can't believe that."

Miller said she was "literally sick" when she heard of the high court's ruling.

"I felt like a bolt of lightning had just hit me. I sincerely thought that those judges would have the sense to keep that man locked up.

"This country is killing us."

Miller and her husband are from Scotland.

Teskey, who has a 20-year history of violence, was declared a dangerous offender and sentenced to an indefinite prison term after he was found guilty in a November 2000 attack that left Dougald Miller unable to speak, move or eat without a feeding tube. His only way of communicating with the world is by blinking.

In a 6-3 ruling, the Supreme Court overturned Teskey's conviction on aggravated assault and other charges, largely on the basis of the trial judge's tardiness in providing written reasons for his decision.

Provincial court Judge Brad Kerby found Teskey guilty in an oral judgment in early 2002, but didn't deliver his written reasons for the verdict until 11 months later.

By then Teskey had appealed the conviction. His lawyers argued that Kerby's written reasons were crafted after the fact, to rebut arguments made in the appeal rather than reflect facts presented at trial.

"It was my feeling all along that the matter hadn't proceeded in a fair fashion," said David Willson, who was Teskey's trial lawyer.

"I know this is viewed by the public as a technical issue rather than a matter of guilt or innocence, but that is the basis of our system."

Justice Louise Charron, writing for the Supreme Court majority, stopped short of concluding that Kerby had actually tailored his written reasons with an eye to the appeal case.

Nevertheless, said Charron, the circumstances were sufficiently unclear that they could raise a reasonable doubt whether justice was done.

Dougald Miller was wheeled on a hospital gurney into a 2005 hearing that finally did see Teskey locked up.

As he listened to the prosecutor describe the brutal attack that left him with a broken skull, nose and jaw and robbed him of his speech, the then-64-year-old sighed and groaned, his eyes blinking as his wife gently stroked his cheek to reassure him.

"Teskey's sitting in his cell and laughing his head off," she said Thursday from her husband's beside at a long-term care facility.

Occasionally, he murmured and moaned.

"He knows I'm getting upset."

During the hearing, also held before Kerby, court was told Teskey, then 34, has been diagnosed as a psychopath by medical experts and has refused treatment.

Teskey attacked Miller after the apartment caretaker found him sleeping in a hallway and asked him to leave.

Miller promised she'd be there for the next trial.

"If it takes 20 years, I'll be there. I'm not going to let (Teskey) win.

"I'm going to talk to as many people as I can and try and get things changed."

Alberta Justice Minister Ron Stevens said he was disappointed in the ruling and would look into what happened. But he said he'd have to proceed carefully out of respect for judicial independence.

"I want to make sure I don't cross any bounds and one of them will not be to pick up the phone and call the trial judge and say, 'What went on here?"' he said.

"No one wants to bring the system of justice into disrepute or undermine the system of justice as the result of a failing in process. That's the last reason why you should have a case overturned."

Stevens has spoken to Justice officials about preparing for a second trial.

Although the Alberta government stepped in with a promise to pick up the tab, the Millers still have to pay $1,000 a month for Dougald's physiotherapy.

The Crown had failed 10 years earlier to have Teskey declared a danger to the public and locked up indefinitely.

He was previously convicted of a list of crimes, including shooting city police Const. Mike Lakusta in 1988 and tearing the penis off the two-year-old son of a girlfriend in 1992.