Tamara Lich’s Lawyer Says Evidence Has Failed to Support Charges Against Freedom Convoy Leaders

Lawrence Greenspon, lawyer for Tamara Lich (not shown), arrives at the courthouse in Ottawa on Oct. 16, 2023. (The Canadian Press/Patrick Doyle)

The evidence revealed thus far in the trial of the main Freedom Convoy leaders has failed to support the charges laid by the Crown, according to the lawyer of organizer Tamara Lich.

“Tamara Lich and Chris Barber are charged with mischief and other related charges, the idea being that they counselled or encouraged truckers to come to Ottawa, stay in Ottawa, and commit various unlawful acts. But so far, the evidence hasn’t supported that Crown theory at all,” Ottawa-based lawyer Lawrence Greenspon said in an interview with “American Thought Leaders” host and Epoch Times senior editor Jan Jekielek.

“The challenge for the prosecution, it’s up to them to, of course, prove that case against Tamara Lich and Chris Barber beyond a reasonable doubt.”

For their role in the trucker protest that disrupted Ottawa for nearly three weeks in early 2022, Ms. Lich and Mr. Barber are charged with counselling to disobey a court order, counselling to obstruct police, and mischief that interferes with the use and enjoyment of property. Their trial in Ottawa, initially expected to last just 16 days, has lasted far longer.

The Freedom Convoy protest started in response to a mandate requiring COVID-19 vaccination for truck drivers crossing the Canada–U.S. border, and resulted in encampments of trucks in the nation’s capital. Similar protests were held at several Canada–U.S. border crossings, where vehicles blocked access to the border.

At the outset of the trial, Crown lawyers claimed that the Freedom Convoy organizers “crossed the line” when they encouraged protestors to “occupy” downtown Ottawa, adding that the protest was “anything but peaceful.”

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Mr. Greenspon said he disagreed with the Crown’s characterization of the protest as an “occupation” when compared to conflicts like the war in Ukraine, saying it was an “insult” to people suffering under real military occupations.

Fundamental Freedoms at Risk

Mr. Greenspon told Mr. Jekielek he took issue with the government’s invocation of the Emergencies Act on Feb. 14, 2022, for the first time in Canadian history. That decision gave Ottawa greater powers to end the protest, including the ability to ban travel to specified zones and to freeze protesters’ bank accounts.

The initial version of the act—the War Measures Act—had been implemented in 1970 in response to the October Crisis. Members of the Front de libération du Québec kidnapped provincial Labour Minister Pierre Laporte and British diplomat James Cross. This led then-prime minister Pierre Trudeau to invoke the War Measures Act, which limited Canadians’ civil liberties and gave police expanded powers to arrest and detain 497 people.

Mr. Greenspon said Mr. Trudeau had referred to the situation as an “apprehended insurrection,” and Canada was “light years from that” on Feb. 14, 2022.

According to Mr. Greenspon, while the honking of horns had been disruptive for Ottawa residents, an injunction on honking was implemented on Feb. 7. “Once the horns were dealt with on February 7, really what took place was peaceful—in our view, lawful—and certainly didn’t justify the imposition of emergency measures that were imposed at that time.”

Mr. Greenspon also said the requirements to invoke the Emergencies Act had not been met, as a day earlier the protest leaders had cooperated with Ottawa police to move trucks out of residential neighbourhoods and into the downtown core. During the trial, police officers and the city’s emergency services manager testified that the police reneged on the deal with the organizers to move the trucks.

“It’s really a mystery to me, as somebody who’s seeing this evidence unfold, how that conclusion could have been reached,” Mr. Greenspon said of the decision to invoke the act. “But according to the commissioner, the prime minister was justified in invoking the emergency measures. Certainly not from what we’re hearing in this trial,” he said, referencing Public Order Emergency Commission head Paul Rouleau’s finding earlier in the year that Ottawa was justified in invoking the Act.

Mr. Greenspon said he believed Canadians’ fundamental freedoms enshrined in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, such as the freedom of peaceful assembly and expression, were at risk in Canada. He added that the right to enjoyment of property, on the other hand, is not found in the Constitution.

“We imported some of the language of the American Constitution ... freedom of expression, freedom of peaceful assembly, but we specifically did not put into our Constitution any right to the enjoyment of property,” he said.

Mr. Greenspon said although he had previously worked on “far more serious” criminal cases involving terrorism and murder, the trial of Lich and Barber was close to lasting longer than the Freedom Convoy protest itself.

“That, I think in and of itself, says something.”