They Didn’t Get Their Phone Call
Case closed.
Tomorrow is supposed to be Nova Scotia trucker Guy Meister’s final day in court. Over two days last week, his lawyer, Brian Doody, verbally presented a 28-page motion that argued the charges against Guy should be stayed.
(That motion was filed a month in advance with the court, but Justice Jonathan Brunet didn’t receive a copy until the morning of the first court day.)
Mr Doody argued that representatives of the crown/government have behaved so improperly, at so many distinct junctures, that this matter should be ended once and for all. Justice is not served by continuing to prosecute Guy, he said.
On the day they were arrested, Guy and his friend, Mike Jamieson, were seated inside Mike’s yellow Freightliner at the Rideau and Sussex intersection in downtown Ottaw. Riot police approached, told Mike to exit the vehicle, and immediately smashed his window with a hammer, scattering glass everywhere. Guy swiftly stepped out of the truck on the passenger side in order to prevent that window from being smashed, as well.
Both men were arrested and held for hours. They spent time in the custody of a series of police officers but were never given access to a lawyer. Let me repeat that. They didn’t get their phone call. A series of officers failed, one after the other, to provide something to which these men were utterly and absolutely entitled: prompt access to legal representation.
Section 10(b) of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms states that everyone has the right “to retain and instruct counsel without delay and to be informed of that right” upon arrest.
That fundamental right - to which even hardened, violent criminals are entitled - was utterly ignored. Some of those same police officers added insult to injury by pressuring Guy and Mike to sign paperwork - knowing full well they had not received the benefit of a lawyer’s guidance.
This is not how things are supposed to work. Not in any society that claims to be civilized.
It is beyond baffling that this matter wasn’t thrown out long ago. Last Friday, Justice Brunet missed another opportunity to do so. He turned down Mr Doody’s request to stay the charges.
So tomorrow we’re back in court. Mr Doody is scheduled to spend the morning presenting his closing arguments as to why Guy should be acquitted of mischief.
Curiously, crown attorney John Wright has indicated he will make his own closing arguments in writing. Which means, apparently, that those of us who have been attending court - including Guy himself - will be denied an opportunity to hear the crown’s closing arguments.
Guy’s friend, Mike, died in May of 2022. He never made a single appearance in court, unlike Guy who has travelled back and forth between Nova Scotia and the Ottawa courthouse numerous times.
These men didn’t get their phone call. That call isn’t a ‘nice to have.’ It’s an absolute constitutional right that was repeatedly and deliberately denied them. By a series of police officers who all appear to have gotten away with a serious breach of the Charter.
That’s all we need to know here, folks.
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Of course, the governing Liberals broke every law on the books with their power grab at the outset of the COVID mess. Five years out, it is not over. The desperation-prosecution continues as a means to convince a naive public it was necessary to destroy justice and legality to end a revolution.
very sobering to see Judges become part of the apparatus they are using - and the charge is Mischief. I'm shaking my head.