Charges Withdrawn

994 days later, Clayton no longer faces a resisting arrest charge for peacefully laying on the ground.

A year ago I told you about Clayton, a former long haul trucker who joined the Freedom Convoy in a pickup truck rather than a big rig.

He still does ice road trucking in the winter, but currently runs a small business the rest of the year. He was 28 at the time of the protest, and near the beginning of the police crackdown laid on the ground, in a gesture of civil disobedience. “I didn't necessarily want to be a leader, but I wanted to set an example,” he says. “What's the most peaceful way I can show that? Give myself up - and kind of make them look like dicks.”  

Clayton on the ground: ‘If you could have told me how to resist less, I would've done it.’

After several hours in police custody, he was transferred to the back of a cruiser, driven around, and then dropped in the middle of nowhere. In the cold and the dark, with a mobile phone that was nearly dead and all his bank accounts frozen. Two of the windows in his truck were gratuitously smashed by police even though he wasn’t inside and the cops had the keys.

Since then, Clayton has been fighting multiple charges, including resisting arrest. Earlier this month, those charges were finally withdrawn. He has signed a one-year peace bond that requires him to behave lawfully, and was required to submit a 100-word essay outlining the difference between peaceful protest and criminal mischief.

When I asked for his thoughts, he says he advises anyone still fighting charges “to not quit and keep pushing.” Refusing earlier plea deals worked out well for him.

You can read Clayton’s story by starting here and cycling through the subsequent installments by clicking the Next arrow at the bottom right of each page.