EZRA LEVANT ｜ Freedom Convoy protestors take the feds to court over 'illegal' invocation of the Emergencies Act
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Summary
Keith Wilson of the Wilson Law Firm in St. Albert, Alberta joins Ezra on the Ezra Levant Show to talk about the massive lawsuit filed against the government of Canada on behalf of victims of the emergency declaration and the people who had their bank accounts seized.
Transcript
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Hello, my friends. Very interesting show today. I'm going to talk at length with Keith Wilson,
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the lawyer who just filed a massive lawsuit against the government of Canada on behalf of
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victims of the Emergencies Act. The people who had their bank accounts seized and frozen.
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We'll go through the lawsuit line by line. I'd love for you to have the video version of this.
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Go to rebelnewsplus.com. Click subscribe. It's eight bucks a month and you can watch the video
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version and have the satisfaction of knowing you're supporting Rebel News. All right, here's
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today's podcast. Tonight, the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.
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As Martin Luther King said that, and it's coming true in Canada. It's February 14th,
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Hey, welcome back. That quote I just said to you was from Martin Luther King. I think about it a lot
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when justice is slow. The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice. That's what
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Martin Luther King said about racial equality in the United States. It was a very long time,
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centuries even, but finally blacks had civil rights. And I think that in Canada, when we had a mass
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suppression of civil rights during the pandemic lockdowns and during the crisis of the invocation
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of the Emergencies Act and the suspension of civil liberties, well, it's been two full years since that,
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and justice has been slow to lace up its boots while the repression of our rights has run around
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the world several times. But it looks to me like justice is finally coming. I have in front of me
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various printouts of various lawsuits filed today. And I'm going to take you through them. These are
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lawsuits filed by Canadian citizens against the government of Canada for the false invocation
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of the Emergencies Act, which has been found by the federal court to have been unreasonable,
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unintelligible, unacceptable, and unconstitutional. I'm going to take you through this with the lawyer
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who drafted it. The lawyer is Keith Wilson of the Wilson Law Firm in St. Albert, Alberta. And the court
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case we'll walk through together are two names you'll know, Tamara Leach and her husband Dwayne Leach,
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and they're suing His Majesty the King and the Attorney General of Canada. Joining us now via Skype
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is Keith Wilson, who filed the lawsuit today. Keith, great to see you again. Thank you very much for
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coming on the show, and thank you for sharing with us the statement of claim that was just filed hours
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ago. Why don't you introduce the story, and then we'll go through the lawsuit, because I think our viewers
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want to see the details. Sure. Thanks for the interview, Ezra. Well, as the world knows,
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the Trudeau government invoked war measures against its citizens who were exercising their
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charter rights of protest. But not only did the Trudeau government do that, our Prime Minister and
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Deputy Prime Minister, Chrystia Freeland, used a tool that no government's ever been able to use
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against its citizens before, because the technology didn't exist. They froze my clients' bank accounts.
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They cancelled their debit cards. They blocked them from getting access to cash. They cancelled not only
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the bank cards, but the credit cards as well. So they completely isolated them from society and put them
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an incredibly precarious position that resulted in a run on the banks and international condemnation
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of the tyrannical behavior of the Trudeau government. So today, on behalf of Tamara Leach and Chris Barber
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and Tom Marazzo and Danny Bullford and Sean Tyson and Miranda Gracer and some others,
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we filed lawsuits against the federal government for the illegal seizure, surveillance, harassment,
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abusive process, intimidation, and charter violations that the federal government engaged in,
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as was recently confirmed by our federal court with Justice Mosley's decision.
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That's incredible. I'm glad you're doing this. You, more than almost anyone else in the country,
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would know the facts on the ground because you were there in Ottawa during the trucker convoy. You
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were the liaison between the truckers and the government. You told me just before we turned
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the camera on that you filed, was it half a dozen of these lawsuits today? How many have you filed and
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what provinces are they filed in? We filed in four provinces in the superior courts of each of the
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provinces that we filed in. We filed in Ontario. We filed in Saskatchewan, Alberta, and British Columbia.
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And the reason we did that is we're suing the federal government. It is the federal government
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that initiated this step. It's the federal government that ordered all of the banks and
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credit unions to not only seize our clients' bank accounts, but surveil their accounts and report all of
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their transactions to the police to cease. Is that new news or has that been out there before?
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I think it's been buried out there before. I mean, it's not new, but I understand why a lot
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of people wouldn't be aware of it. Yeah. To have the banks spy on their customers,
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that truly is China-style social credit. By the way, we looked very carefully at the federal
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court ruling that struck down the Emergencies Act and declared it illegal and declared the
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manner in which it was invoked unconstitutional. One of the specific things that the federal
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court said was, by attacking bank accounts, it was a sloppy, broad brush that punished people
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imprecisely, entire families would be destroyed because one person was targeted. I mean, a lot of
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people have family joint bank accounts between spouses, but all of a sudden the mom can't afford
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groceries or school costs. That was something specifically mentioned by the federal court.
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Is that reflected in your lawsuits today? Yes. And so what we've done is any of the people that I
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represent that had joint accounts. So one of our clients, her accounts were frozen,
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but she had a joint account with her adult daughter. So we've sued on her behalf as well,
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because they were all punished equally. People who weren't even in Ottawa or close to Ottawa
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had their bank accounts frozen. And Justice Mosley was very concerned about that. He cited that as an
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example in his decision. The idea of collective punishment is not a concept in Canadian law. It's
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not a concept in Western law. That's a barbaric form of punishment. And that's what the government
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of Canada chose. I'd like to walk through the lawsuit because our viewers, although most of them are not
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lawyers, they, I think they can, they're familiar with lawsuits and they understand that lawsuits are
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a tool that you need sometimes to correct outrageous acts of public policy. So I would like to now walk
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through the filed lawsuit that was filed this morning in Alberta on behalf of Tamara Leach and her husband
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Dwayne. So we're going to show this on the screen. You can see the stamp in the top right hand corner,
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Tamara Leach and Dwayne Leach. And I'll just skip over some of those preamble and then I'll just come to the
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party. So I'm just going to read, I'll read a paragraph or I might skip over some of the more
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administrative ones. And then I'll ask you to give some expansion of these, because I think it's very
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interesting to see the primary documents. And by the way, I don't know if the regime media, if the CBC are
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going to cover these things fairly, they might, by the way, I don't want to prejudge, but I don't
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know if they will. So let's just jump right in. The parties, the plaintiff Tamara Leach is an
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individual Canadian citizen and resident of the City of Medicine Hat in Alberta. The plaintiff Dwayne
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Leach is an individual Canadian citizen and a resident of the City of Medicine Hat in Alberta,
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and is the spouse of the plaintiff Tamara Leach here and after collectively referred to as the
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plaintiffs. The plaintiffs have five children and four grandchildren. So you're just describing who they
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are. I think that's sort of obvious. The defendants are-
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Well, the reason that's important, I'm going to stop you right there, because that's critically
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important. I won't stop you on every one, is those are the people they needed to care for.
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Those are the people that they could not care for.
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Tom Marazzo has a son, and this is in his lawsuit, and it's explained, and Tom has spoken publicly about
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this so I know that he will be okay with me telling you and your viewers this. His son has a severe
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genetic-based heart issue, and during this period of time where his account was frozen,
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he needed on an emergency basis to get a prescription filled for his son's heart.
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Wow. Huh. Well, thank you for that interruption. That was a very useful- I mean, that's why it's
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relevant. You've got five kids and four grandkids. It's very relevant because they were the punching
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That was the fear of my clients, is that they felt so isolated, so overwhelmed. It's like, oh my god,
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what's going to happen to our mortgage, our car payment, our insurance payment?
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We can't get gas. We can't buy food. We can't even move. We can't move, like move is in terms of
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physically transport ourselves. Yeah. Now, paragraph three is a little bit technical,
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but I'll read it anyways. The defendants are His Majesty the King and the Attorney General of Canada,
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being the statutory nominee of His Majesty, who proceedings against the Crown may be taken
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in the name of pursuant to Section 23-1 of the Crown Liability and Proceedings Act. So that's
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basic. When you're suing the government, you say you're suing the king. Obviously, it's got nothing
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to do with King Charles, but you can sue the government for wrongdoing. And we have the proof
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of the wrongdoing in the form of the federal court. So this is how you go about suing the feds,
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Okay. Background. On or about February 15th, 2022, at the request of the Government of Canada,
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all of the plaintiffs' personal accounts at the Toronto Dominion Bank, including related
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debt cards, ATM access, and credit card services, were frozen without notice. The plaintiffs were
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unable to withdraw or deposit money from their frozen accounts or make credit card purchases,
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and any automatic payments associated with the frozen accounts were canceled. That's terrifying,
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that automatic payments, like a lot of people set up their phone bills or their utility bills or
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even their mortgage on an automatic payment. That's frozen too, eh?
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They couldn't get paid. You know what? I dare say that most people, if their bank account was frozen,
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within two weeks they would be in a crisis of some sort. They would miss a mortgage payment,
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they would miss a payment, things would be starting to shut down in their lives. But before I move on
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to the next paragraph, this was February 15th, and it's no coincidence that today is the last day
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for the two-year period, because in law there's certain limitations. You have to move quickly on
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your rights. And today is basically the last day to sue the government to be sure you're within the
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two-year window. There may be some arguments that, you know, you could do so a little bit later because
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the damage is considered, continued later, etc. But by suing today, a day before the second
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anniversary, you are ensuring that you're within the two-year time period, right?
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That's right. I mean, there's a good argument, Ezra, and last time you interviewed me on the
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federal court decision on the EA, I mentioned that, you know, you could argue that the limitation
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period starts to run from when Justice Mosley released his decision. However, as an experienced
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litigator, you want to avoid issues. So if you can file before the earliest conceivable possible
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limitation period, then you don't have to waste time on the other side. In the government,
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when you're fighting the federal government, they have unlimited resources. So even if they have a 5%
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chance on knocking you on a limitation argument, they're going to run it, and they're going to make
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you spend money for your clients. And I don't want to dissuade other people from taking legal action
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because I think it could easily be argued that the pain and damages and punishments continued.
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It wasn't just Feb 15. It was Feb 16, Feb 17, Feb 18. I forget exactly how long it was around. So
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obviously, it's not over yet, but do not sit on your rights. Okay, I'll keep reading. The plaintiffs were
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not notified of the freeze on the frozen accounts. The reason for the freeze or how long the freeze period
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would last. They first realized the frozen accounts were frozen when their debit cards and credit cards
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were declined and payments were rejected. How do you eat? So many people don't even carry cash anymore.
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They just beep with their Google Pay or Apple Pay or just tap with a card. I mean, I used to walk around
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with 100 bucks in my pocket. You never know what for, a cab or a meal. I think a lot of people go out with any cash,
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without any cash at all. You might not even be able to eat that day if your credit cards are all frozen.
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And the next thing you're going to do is look at your gas gauge.
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Right, right. And you're going to hope it's close to a full tank because you're not getting fuel.
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Right. Okay, I'll keep going. The government of Canada is freezing the plaintiff's accounts
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caused immediate financial instability and fear. I bet you. And I think that's one of the reasons they did it,
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a PSYOP, to terrify people. There was a lot of that going on during the lockdowns. That outrageous interim
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police chief in Ottawa who threatened any donor, we're going to track you down. A lot of the abuse
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that was theatrical to terrify people. I think it was a form of terrorizing others so they don't step
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out of line. Let me keep reading your lawsuit. The plaintiffs were unable to access funds necessary for
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daily living expenses, purchase food, fuel, medicines, bill payments, and other essential services.
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This disruption deprived the plaintiffs of the ability to conduct basic financial transactions
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and live normal lives, leading to severe inconvenience, hardship, embarrassment.
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That's another thing too. I mean, it's embarrassing when you can't pay a bill.
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You're embarrassed to the person, you know, you go to a restaurant, your credit cards decline.
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Or the lineup at the grocery store with the kids and the carts loaded with the bagged groceries.
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And everybody's getting impatient because the calls I was getting in Ottawa at the time from
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spouses back home was they would try their credit card number one, their credit card number two,
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Yeah. And every time they try it, then the cashier would grab it and rub it on their sleeve
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And then having to leave with the kids with no groceries.
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Oh, boy. You know, and I'll finish the sentence in your lawsuit, leading to severe inconvenience,
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hardship, embarrassment, exclusion from modern society, and damaged personal and business
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relationships. I can only imagine, I mean, it doesn't happen to me often, but every once in a
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while a credit card I use has declined. And I am deeply embarrassed. I'm embarrassed for myself.
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I'm embarrassed that I put the other person through this. And I can imagine if I was shut down in
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every single way and you can't go to an ATM, like you would be scared. I mean, I guess you would call
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your closest friend and say, can I borrow some cash? But, you know, it's, but even that, okay,
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I'll keep going. Paragraph eight, the plaintiffs also suffered and experienced fear and anxiety
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due to the anticipated loss of income due to the freezes, as salary, wage, and payments were
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directed to the frozen accounts, causing delays in meeting financial obligations, such as rent,
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mortgage payments, and loan repayments. Additionally, the freeze resulted in accrued fees. Yeah,
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of course, penalties and interest charges on outstanding balances exacerbating the financial
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strain. Well, I think that speaks for itself. Do you have anything to add there or should I keep going?
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Keep going. Okay. You know what? And I'm not going to read every word of this because some of it is a
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little bit technical, but I think that this is a good reminder of what it was like. And it's been two
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years and most people don't wear masks anymore. And I don't think people follow this six feet of
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separation rule anymore. And no one's banned from flying on planes anymore because they're unjabbed.
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So a lot of us has moved on and the, you know, the body heals, the mind heals. And we, we forget
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what it was like, but at the time it was a crisis. It, it, it felt terrifying. And I can only imagine,
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and by the way, we didn't know if it was going to get worse or better. We didn't know how long
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the Emergencies Act would be in effect. And was this just the first step? By the way, I remember the
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media party wanted more. They wanted the government to go harder, by the way. Okay.
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Let me get back to your lawsuit. The plaintiffs state that the government of Canada initiated the
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freezing of bank accounts and credit cards for the improper purpose of dissuading and punishing
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the plaintiffs for their exercising of fundamental charter rights in the form of protesting
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government COVID-19 mandates and restrictions. The plaintiffs continue to suffer negative effects
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from the frozen account, really to this today, including rejection of business funding
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application. I bet, because of course you've got all these black marks in your credit now.
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Rejection of business funding applications and the necessity to secure a loan through a lease
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company at a high interest rate with full collapse. So that's still going on.
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Representatives for the banks have stated the plaintiffs bank accounts will be marked
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indefinitely into the future, affecting their ability to conduct normal banking and financing. And banks,
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you know, once they have something on you, you're never purging that from their files. I mean,
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banks are tough to deal with at the best of times.
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On March 7th, 2022, the Senior Vice President and General Counsel for the Canadian Bankers Association
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testified before the House of Commons Committee on Finance. And she was asked this a number of times,
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and she volunteered because she was asked by some of the members of parliament on that committee
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as to whether there would be any lasting effect to those Canadians, including my clients, who had their
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bank accounts frozen. And she said, yes, the accounts will be marked for life.
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You know, I know a little bit about being debanked. I don't know if you remember the story a couple
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years ago, Rebel News applied for a mortgage at the Royal Bank and they were thrilled to give it to us.
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They told us that on the phone, but then they checked with their headquarters and for political
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reasons, they denied us. And that was painful to me, but it was just an idea for an office.
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And I mean, I guess I got over it, but I was still very mad at them.
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But that's the best of times. And if you've got this mark on you that the finance minister called
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the bank and said, you, this is a bad dude, you're never getting that mark of cane off of you.
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I just, you know, I want to read the next paragraph here because I just glanced ahead.
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Yeah. In addition, the government of Canada also announced publicly in early February 2022 that
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it had ordered the banks to conduct surveillance, I didn't know this, of all the plaintiffs' personal
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and business transactions and to report that confidential financial information to the RCMP,
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CSIS, and the government of Canada's Financial Intelligence Agency for anti-money laundering and
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anti-terrorist FinTrack. We got Hamas protesters in the street flying the literal flags of
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terrorists, but the RCMP and FinTrack are chasing down moms and dads who sent 50 bucks to the truckers.
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Yeah. And that's an abusive process. It's a clear violation of charter rights. And that's something
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that Justice Mosley with the federal court was very concerned about, was the collection of that
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information without any process, without clear authority to do so. So yeah, it's another layering
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of the egregious activity that this government engaged in that we don't recognize as a Canadian
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thing to do that we associate with a communist or a total authoritarian regime.
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Yeah. Unbelievable, but completely believe. You know, it's funny. I read the book 1984 more
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often now than I did before, especially since the Rebel News republished it in our own version. And I
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listen to people who experienced tyranny in the Eastern Bloc, in the Soviet Bloc, people from Poland,
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people from Romania. And the way they describe it is one thing, and I've been to the House of Horrors
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in Budapest, Hungary, which is a museum both to the Nazi and the communist repression.
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By the way, the Secret Service of both the Nazis and the communists used the same headquarters,
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which I think shows you a lot. And of course, what they did was horrific, and they engaged in
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murder and things like that. But let me say this. There wasn't the total surveillance state back then.
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They didn't track, there weren't credit cards back then in any way that, like the tracking of money and
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the surveillance was, I'm not going to say lighter because it had a much bloodier hand,
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but they didn't have this panopticon scrutinizing your entire life. They didn't have the same surveillance
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tools then that we have now. In some ways, you could have avoided it more easily back then,
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even though they were totalitarian regimes. At least that's how I take it here.
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Listen, I want to skip ahead a little bit because there's some technical, you have a section
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two called claim of the plaintiffs, where you describe how the Emergencies Act was invoked
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and the February 15th orders. I'm actually going to skip over that because you're just retelling the
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history of it. What I'm going to do though, Keith, is I'm going to put this PDF on our website for people
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to click in and read at their leisure, to read it slowly. And some of it they're going to, you know,
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you're talking about special order, you know, order in council that you just skip that if it's
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gobbledygook to you. But that's just describing how these orders came into force.
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I'm going to read section 18 though, even though it's a little bit complicated,
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because I'm going to ask you a question in a minute. So let me read this.
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Sure. Section 2-1 of the February 15th economic order, so this was one of the orders under the
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Emergency Act, required that the following entities freeze accounts and access to assets belonging to
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anyone that owns, holds, or controls on behalf of any designated person, banks, including foreign
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banks as per the Bank Act, cooperative credit societies, etc., etc., and then insurance companies.
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So I remember reading that, and I looked up the list of foreign banks, because there's an official
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government of Canada list of foreign banks that are allowed to do business in Canada. There's the
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Canadian banks that we all know, but then there's foreign banks like Citibank, you know, Wells Fargo,
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the bigger American banks have some branches in Toronto and maybe Vancouver and Calgary.
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Same with some European banks, at least I read the American banks.
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And what was incredible to me is that this emergency order applied to them, too.
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And my first thought was, okay, a Canadian bank that is totally within the laws of Canada,
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and that has to deal with Chrystia Freeland, who I think was finance minister at the time,
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they're going to do exactly what Chrystia Freeland says.
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But what about a foreign bank, especially an American bank, that their main concern is
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U.S. law, including privacy law, including the First Amendment, which protects Americans to some
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extent for their politics. So you're an American bank, you have to follow American law, and you
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better not mess around. But you've got maybe five branches in Canada, and Canada has gone full
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Venezuela now. Canada is asking you to spy on customers that probably have certain legal rights
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against you because you're an American bank. And so I don't know, and maybe you know, I don't know
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if any American banks complied with this. I imagine they were in a terrible pickle, because on the one
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hand, break Canadian law, and you're in trouble in Canada. On the other hand, follow Canadian law,
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and maybe break American law. Now you're in deep trouble. This is the kind of moment that a foreign
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bank probably calls up the finance minister and says, you know, if you make us go through this,
00:25:27.760
we're going to have to shut down our branches in Canada, and you want to see a run on the banks.
00:25:31.920
Imagine if every U.S. bank pulled out of Canada saying it's no longer a reliable jurisdiction.
00:25:36.560
So that was something that was always on my mind. One of my thoughts was that maybe it was American banks
00:25:41.760
who got on the phone to the government and said, you've got to end this, or we're going to do
00:25:45.760
something that will truly embarrass your country being run on the banks. That was my speculation.
00:25:50.320
Do you, Keith, have any knowledge or information about how, whether or not any foreign banks actually
00:25:58.400
implemented these draconian rules on their own clients?
00:26:01.200
I do. I've seen no evidence that any foreign bank did. That was one sector that decided this
00:26:09.680
was a bridge too far. They were not going to go there. Another was the insurance companies. They
00:26:16.000
were told to cancel all of the insurance policies. If you read the economic order, February 15th,
00:26:22.400
2022, it instructs the banks to stop providing financial services, credit cards, debit cards,
00:26:29.200
access to bank accounts, mortgages, credit lines, lines of credit, et cetera, credit facilities.
00:26:35.280
It instructed the insurance companies to cease providing all forms of insurance, automobile
00:26:40.480
insurance, home insurance, life insurance. And it also instructed the financial investment firms,
00:26:47.840
RBC Diminished Securities, Scotia McLeod, all those to somehow cancel people's RRSPs and all these
00:26:55.760
other things. Well, the latter two didn't play. The insurance companies didn't do it. And the
00:27:01.120
investment firms were like, well, what are we supposed to do? Sell their stocks? How are we
00:27:06.640
So they didn't act. But one last point on this, because it goes to what you're wondering about is
00:27:13.200
Krista Freeland has said a number of times in the last year and her notes to this effect
00:27:22.000
around this banana republic issue. This banana republic comment were put in evidence at the
00:27:28.560
POEC, the public inquiry into the Emergencies Act invocation that occurred in the fall of 2022.
00:27:34.560
And Freeland says that she had investors and bankers calling her from the U.S. saying
00:27:42.320
Canada is a banana republic because of the protest. But if you actually look at what it said in the
00:27:47.280
notes, it was, I'm concerned Canada's become a banana republic because what you've done with
00:27:52.960
freezing protesters' bank accounts. So, yes, they did have a strong reaction. And I think it was a
00:27:59.280
part of the strong impetus for them to so quickly revoke the invocation of the Emergencies Act. But the
00:28:05.520
freezings of the bank accounts lingered for many months for a number of my clients.
00:28:09.920
I did not know that. Now, you said something, but you said it, I think,
00:28:13.920
sort of quickly. And I just want to make sure I heard you correctly.
00:28:19.600
Did you say that the invocation of the Emergencies Act and the orders that flowed there from
00:28:27.440
required insurance companies to cancel life insurance for these?
00:28:32.720
Required them to cancel all insurance. It ordered them not to provide any insurance services to any
00:28:40.080
Canadians. That's insane. That's crazy. And by the way, life insurance, if I have life insurance,
00:28:47.680
it doesn't benefit me. God forbid, when I die. I mean, we're all going to die. It goes to my family.
00:28:53.520
So you're not even hurting the guy who's got the insurance. You're hurting the beneficiaries,
00:29:03.280
Let me describe something, Ezra, that no one's asked me to describe before.
00:29:08.960
So we knew on the Sunday evening, the 13th, that we heard rumors that the IRC and the Committee of
00:29:16.240
Cabinet were meeting over at the Parliament and the Executive Office, and that they were likely to
00:29:20.960
decide to invoke the Emergencies Act. We were tipped off about that. That was simultaneous while we had a
00:29:25.840
meeting going on at City Hall with the police and the emergency services and the trucker leadership on
00:29:31.040
the coordination of moving all the trucks out of the downtown residential area starting the next
00:29:34.960
morning. On the Monday, Valentine's Day, two years ago today, was when the federal government
00:29:42.320
officially announced the invocation of the Emergencies Act. And then it was the next day,
00:29:47.680
the Tuesday of that week, so the 15th of February 2022, where we actually got to see the two,
00:29:54.480
the emergency order and the economic measures order. So all of the leadership of the convoy assembled in a
00:30:00.000
big boardroom at the top of the Sheridan Hotel, and I sat at the head table with Tamara and I was
00:30:04.000
asked to explain to them what this meant. And at that point, they were all learning that through
00:30:09.120
phone calls in real time from spouses and others that their bank accounts were frozen. And I had to
00:30:13.440
explain to them that not only can they freeze your bank accounts, this order says that you're supposed
00:30:18.480
to have all your insurance policies cancelled. Could you imagine the reaction? But you know what was
00:30:22.400
interesting? The reaction around the room was strength. They didn't buckle and cry. They understood
00:30:30.480
that the tyrant was desperate. Wow. Wow. Absolutely. Yeah, I don't know if you know this,
00:30:37.520
Keith, but when they started seizing bank accounts here at Rebel News, I thought we're not truckers,
00:30:43.840
but we're trucker adjacent, if I can make up a word. You know, we were covering the truckers,
00:30:48.480
we were checking the truckers. Sure. We even crowdfunded for different legals, as you know.
00:30:53.440
Yeah. And so I thought to myself, you know, we didn't actually protest at Rebel News. It might have
00:30:59.840
sort of felt like it, but we were covering the protest really close up. We were sort of embedded
00:31:04.640
with them. And by the way, we had nine, we had two guys down at the Cooch blockade right in the saloon.
00:31:10.480
And so I thought, you know, because we didn't know how bad it was going to get. Was this
00:31:15.440
the first step down to a deeper basement or was this a blip? We didn't know. How would we know?
00:31:20.800
How would we know it would last this many days or that many days? So I thought, you know, just the
00:31:27.120
same way there instantly was a domino effect, a cascading effect of bad things when your credit
00:31:32.320
cards are gone. I forgot. Question one is how do I eat? Question two is my gas tank. Like,
00:31:38.160
I just imagine all the things that happened. So I thought
00:31:42.560
it would be very easy for either Christian Freeland herself or just some highly partisan staffer in
00:31:47.680
her office to give a call to our bank and say, hey, seize Rebel News. Is that paranoia? I don't
00:31:54.240
think it's particularly paranoid to say that because they hated Rebel News. So we prepaid our entire staff
00:32:02.960
We paid off every bill we had. Like, you know, sometimes you wait 15 days or 30 days to pay
00:32:09.520
bills. We paid all our accounts payable down to zero. And we prepaid the entire staff a month.
00:32:16.720
And I said to people, that's not a bonus. That's not extra money. That's your next month's money.
00:32:22.000
Because I thought the same thing. If they cut us off, you know, how many of our staff would be able to
00:32:28.320
wait around two weeks, four weeks, six weeks, eight weeks? They wouldn't. They would have had
00:32:32.880
to quit. So I was very scared. And it sounds like I had reason to be scared. Now, thank God they didn't
00:32:38.560
come for us. But I felt like we were paper thin away from it. I don't mean to talk about ourselves,
00:32:44.080
but I remember how I felt. I was very scared about that very scenario because there's no way a bank
00:32:48.800
would have stood up for us. We're nothing to a bank. They don't even like us. Okay, let me move forward.
00:32:53.680
There's a lot here. There's no way I can read it all. I want to encourage people to read the whole
00:32:57.600
document, which we're going to post on the website. I'm just going to pick and choose a
00:33:01.840
few paragraphs because I'm cognizant of the time. I get paragraph 20. Section five of the economic
00:33:08.560
order compelled all financial service entities to immediately disclose to the commissioner of the
00:33:14.320
RCMP or the director of thesis any information with regards to transactions and property owned,
00:33:20.480
held, or controlled on behalf of a designated person. So all of a sudden your property, what
00:33:26.720
does that got to do with it? Your property to cease this to the RCMP? Do you have a word on that
00:33:33.200
other than how crazy it is? Well, I mean, can you believe you're even hearing this happened in
00:33:39.360
Canada? Yeah. Like that's how bad things have become in our country under this government. These
00:33:43.920
are the tyrannical. And remember, remember in your mind, and maybe you can find the clip at some
00:33:49.440
point, the next day when Freeland held the press conference to announce these measures and how she
00:33:55.440
was particularly, well, her normal degree of extreme twitching, but she was giddy. She was laughing.
00:34:03.280
I remember that. It was so chilling. She was so excited. As of today, a bank or other financial
00:34:12.480
service provider will be able to immediately freeze or suspend an account without a court order. In doing
00:34:22.800
so, they will be protected against civil liability for actions taken in good faith. Federal government
00:34:31.680
institutions will have a new broad authority to share relevant information with banks and other
00:34:39.840
financial service providers to ensure that we can all work together to put a stop to the funding of
00:34:47.120
these illegal blockades. This is about following the money. This is about stopping the financing of
00:34:57.520
these illegal blockades. We are today serving notice. If your truck is being used in these illegal blockades,
00:35:08.480
your corporate accounts will be frozen. The insurance on your vehicle will be suspended. Send your
00:35:18.240
semi-trailers home. The Canadian economy needs them to be doing legitimate work, not to be illegally
00:35:27.760
making us all poorer. You're so right. And here's something that I remember Judge Mosley of the
00:35:33.520
federal court pointed out. These are insane orders, just absolutely insane. But here, this next one's
00:35:39.280
important. Paragraph 21, neither the February 15 emergency order or the economic order specified a
00:35:45.520
procedure through which financial service providers would identify individuals or entities that met the
00:35:50.720
definition of a designated person or their surveilled personal financial information. So they're just
00:35:56.480
saying to the banks, I'm no fan of the banks, but the banks are not used to working as spies. I mean,
00:36:01.840
they sort of do, they keep an eye, you know, there's no your customer rules. And if there's a huge cash
00:36:06.480
deposit, maybe the banks, you know, a light goes on and they check, is this money laundry? Okay. So
00:36:11.440
they do sort of keep an eye on things, but to start building enemies lists, to start making lists,
00:36:17.360
like, I don't think the banks were built for that. And so I can only imagine the haphazard, bizarre
00:36:25.360
ways that they, that they tried to fulfill this order. I'm glad to hear the foreign banks did it,
00:36:29.840
but I wonder, do you have any information about the ways in which banks tried to follow these laws?
00:36:36.000
Well, first there was the list. And I remember I revealed that list to you
00:36:40.720
first, uh, on, on an interview I did with you. Cause I just received it. I think I was back from
00:36:46.080
Ottawa at that point. Yeah. I would have been back here just a few days, uh, from the crackdown on the
00:36:51.280
protest. But the other thing that they did was they instructed. So some of my clients who I've sued for
00:36:58.720
today were not on the list. And at first I was puzzled by this, but a justice mostly talks about
00:37:04.240
this. The banks were instructed to be on the lookout for anybody they thought. So apparently
00:37:10.560
farm credit corporation was caught and it was been documented. You can, people can Google this
00:37:16.240
reporting any customer that came into their branch office and, and, and they had a pickup truck with
00:37:24.640
So they were looking for people coming in with any signs that they were. Oh my God. That, that is true
00:37:31.920
third world. That's exactly what happened. And they, they were searching, they were searching social
00:37:37.120
media and the legacy media. They, cause it placed the banks under two positive duties initially, like
00:37:45.200
in the first instance of the process. One was to respond to the list from the RCMP, which we know from
00:37:50.480
that interview I did with you years ago was made up of some RCMP officer searching, uh, and finding
00:37:56.640
who's who in the freedom convoy on CTV news website, which was just ridiculous. But then the second thing
00:38:03.200
they were supposed to do was regardless of the list, they were to look for signs that, that their
00:38:11.360
customers were freedom fighters or were protesting government COVID mandates. And that was enough,
00:38:16.000
their suspicion. They were then under a positive legal duty to do it. And a couple of my clients
00:38:21.840
were not on any list, but they were self caught by, by, and then they were using the rumor mill. And,
00:38:28.000
you know, I talked to Gertrude and she said that Bob was in Ottawa last week. Oh, there you go. Freezes
00:38:32.800
bank account. That's literally what happened. And that, you know what, if for those who study the Soviet
00:38:37.440
bloc and those who study the Nazis, the, the gossip, the informants, the snitches, I mean, how many people were
00:38:45.360
KGB informants or Stassi informants? That's exactly. And, and, you know, I often say that,
00:38:52.240
you know, we're genetically the same as the people who were in the Soviet Union and the Nazis were,
00:38:56.400
were, in fact, I would say we're morally the same. We're in fact, we're, I think we're weaker
00:39:00.400
morally than people were 80 or a hundred years ago. And there are those amongst us who in a
00:39:06.720
society built on tyranny and fear, that would, that would be their moment. There were people who
00:39:13.120
were terrified and outraged by this emergencies act, but then there were people who were positively
00:39:18.160
erotic about the new world and their place in it. And they wanted to be in forces and they wanted to
00:39:23.680
be snitches and they wanted, they, they, they wanted to be on the side of the tyrant. And don't think for
00:39:30.480
a second that, um, that there weren't people who were thrilled to be, to be ratting out friends and
00:39:38.880
even family. I want to whip through this because there's no way to go through this entire document
00:39:44.080
in, in less than like three hours, especially if we're chatting about it. Um, sure.
00:39:50.880
I'm going to read what's called cause of action, which I think is legal speak for the reason you're
00:39:56.320
suing or, or summarizing the grievance. So I'm going to read these in a row. Um,
00:40:04.000
and, uh, I shall read them one at a time and maybe you can give me a sentence or two
00:40:10.080
rather than having me read the page just because we're short of time.
00:40:13.360
Yeah, I can do that, Ezra. Cause of action. Number one, the government of Canada violated the
00:40:17.760
plaintiff's rights protected by section eight of the charter and damages for said violation under
00:40:24.400
section 24 are appropriate. What's section eight of the charter? Well, section eight is the charter is
00:40:30.880
the section that protects you against unreasonable search and seizure by government and police,
00:40:35.520
but section 24 is really important. And it's the basis for this lawsuit because a lot of people
00:40:39.600
don't understand this because people have been frustrated. I see this online and elsewhere. Well,
00:40:44.880
how come the prime minister hasn't been arrested? The federal court, Justice Mosley said what he did
00:40:49.840
was illegal. Well, you only get arrested if you engage in criminal or statutory breaches of law,
00:40:54.880
not, not, not other, uh, uh, extra, uh, judicial or rather an act where you exceeded your legal
00:41:02.800
jurisdiction, which is the case here with the emergencies act. However, under our charter of
00:41:08.960
rights and freedom, section 24 exists to say, if the government violates your rights as a citizen,
00:41:17.360
you have the right to sue the government for damages and the government has to pay you compensation.
00:41:24.080
Right. And the reason is to create accountability, accountability. And we all know that we have
00:41:32.080
lived through a time of a complete absence of accountability by this government for everything
00:41:37.760
from arrive can scam to his travel nonsense to I'd be here for an hour, just listing off the scandals.
00:41:44.880
So section 24 is a mechanism baked into the charter of rights and freedoms.
00:41:50.240
It's made of steel, legal steel. And it says, if the government breaches your rights,
00:41:56.560
they're going to pay. And the reason it's there, and the Supreme Court of Canada has made this clear,
00:42:02.080
is to show that the charter rights mean something. And that's something that's frustrated a lot of us,
00:42:08.960
lawyers and non-lawyers alike. What happened to the charter during the last three, four years?
00:42:13.200
Number two is if you've suffered harm through your breach or to get compensated. And the third one,
00:42:21.040
get this, the purpose of section 24 is to deter the government and future governments from stepping
00:42:28.640
on Canadians' rights. So that's why we've sued and its fundamental foundation is section 24 of the charter.
00:42:35.520
You're right. And let me take a crack at this, explaining it from another perspective. And you
00:42:39.840
correct me if I'm wrong. So if, if you're in a car accident, you know, the courts will assess,
00:42:47.040
well, how much have you actually been damaged? Well, your car was worth 10 grand and you broke
00:42:51.440
your leg and we think that's worth 20 grand. So they do the math based on the loss that you had.
00:42:57.440
Can you quantify it? If you, if you have a breach of a contract, well, how much should you lose?
00:43:01.360
Maybe you can prove it. But if someone breaches your rights, how do you quantify that? It's not
00:43:06.640
the same as a normal tort or a normal contract dispute or a property dispute. So is it correct
00:43:12.160
to say that what section 24 does is it, is it basically says when you violate freedom of speech
00:43:18.960
or freedom of the press or freedom of association or freedom from warrantless search and seizures,
00:43:23.440
which is one of the issues here, you can't, it's not just a verbal rebuke from the court,
00:43:29.520
you will pay someone because these are valuable, tangible things, even though they're sort of
00:43:34.080
intangible, right? It's worth something and you got to pay up. Is that, is, am I thinking about it
00:43:38.960
the right way here? It's, it's giving. Precisely. Yeah. Okay. I thought so. Cause,
00:43:43.680
cause that's what's been missing the last two years. And that's why I lost these lawsuits today.
00:43:49.200
Okay. I want to rip through this cause we're coming up on an hour here. Cause of action number two,
00:43:54.560
the government of Canada committed the tort of interference with an economic interest of the
00:43:59.600
plaintiffs. So that's, that's not necessarily relying on the, on the charter. That's actually,
00:44:05.520
you can quantify how much you've been damaged financially by this obviously. Right. That's
00:44:11.280
right. And there's also what we call general damages, which are the intangible things that you
00:44:16.880
can't, you know, an accountant can't calculate for you, uh, because of the, uh, the conduct being
00:44:23.840
so egregious and so deliberate that, um, uh, it should attract a word of damages.
00:44:29.360
This, this litigation will be studied in law schools. I tell you that because to the number
00:44:34.880
of torts, the number of charter violations by the greatest violation of our civil liberties in
00:44:40.400
the generation, that's what it is. I don't think it's dramatic to say that invoking the Marshall,
00:44:46.240
the new version of the war measures act is the greatest abridgment of our civil liberties in
00:44:50.800
the generation. In fact, it wasn't even used during 9 11. So I don't think it's dramatic to say that.
00:44:55.440
And so obviously you're, if you're someone who was abused by it, if it was imposed illegally,
00:44:59.440
which the court has said, obviously you're going to have a festival of, uh, causes of action.
00:45:05.760
Next one, the government of Canada committed the tort of abuse of process against the plaintiffs.
00:45:10.880
I think that speaks for itself. Give me one sentence on that.
00:45:14.880
By not establishing criteria, by telling banks to look out for anybody wearing a Canadian flag,
00:45:20.800
for telling the banks to collect all the information about your transactions and send
00:45:24.720
it to CSIS and FinTrack and the RCMP. Yeah. Cause of action number four. And I think of that
00:45:30.720
interim Ottawa police chief Bell who tried to scare people. Remember that? Here's a clip of him
00:45:35.520
basically threatening to hunt down anyone who donated 10 bucks to the truckers. Here's a clip of
00:45:40.880
this odious man. Take a look. As I indicated earlier, we will have the opportunity to review
00:45:45.840
all of those files. There are complaint mechanisms for people to enter into if they feel that there is
00:45:51.120
excessive use of force by members of our police service. What I will also say is we have been here
00:45:58.480
for three weeks. I have been at this podium for the last five days, imploring people to leave,
00:46:06.080
asking them to get out of our streets. This occupation is over. We have advised them that
00:46:11.840
if they peacefully leave, they may go home. That still exists. We also indicated that we would escalate
00:46:18.720
and forcefully remove people from the streets if they did not comply. Some of that is what you're
00:46:24.000
seeing. So I will stand here today again and say this demonstration is over. Go home. If you don't
00:46:30.640
go home, we will remove you from the streets. If you are involved in this protest, we will actively
00:46:35.680
look to identify you and follow up with financial sanctions and criminal charges. Absolutely.
00:46:41.360
Yeah, that's not policing. That's something, but that ain't policing. I thought of it because
00:46:48.400
I'm looking at cause of action number four. The government of Canada committed the tort of intimidation.
00:46:54.000
Against the plaintiffs fundamental freedoms under the charter. Give me a line on that.
00:46:59.680
This one's really important. And I'm going to steal a steal a couple extra lines,
00:47:03.680
sentences if I can, because it links to other charter rights, which is right, right, right, right.
00:47:09.200
I mean, it seems kind of obvious, but I need to say it, you know, and go back to that clip we watched of
00:47:14.240
giddy twitchy deputy prime minister Freeland. They wanted to scare the leadership of the freedom
00:47:22.320
convoy out of the downtown. They wanted to scare them away. They wanted to intimidate them
00:47:28.640
into ceasing the exercise of their section two charter rights of freedom of expression,
00:47:35.040
of assembly, of political dissent. So they were using this tyrannical tool to wipe my clients out from
00:47:45.360
civil society and put the fear of God into them for their ability to provide for themselves and their
00:47:50.720
children and their loved ones and their businesses for the purpose, the improper purpose of causing them
00:47:57.600
to surrender their charter rights, their charter right of freedom of expression, political dissent,
00:48:01.840
and peaceful assembly. So that's a really important one. And it exists outside of any charter context,
00:48:09.840
because it's an old common law tort, and it's used rarely because you're so rarely going to get these
00:48:17.280
facts, but it fits here. Yeah. Huh. Isn't that interesting? Well, I think so much of the pandemic
00:48:26.880
policy was specifically designed to be as scary as possible. And I mean, I think of the hotel,
00:48:34.800
the airport quarantine hotels, which were so atrocious. And I thought, this can't be on,
00:48:40.160
this can't be. And the senior lawyer said, no, no, no, it's designed to be as abusive and outrageous.
00:48:46.640
So, so that people squawk about it and people tell a hundred friends about it.
00:48:50.880
And those hundred people are deterred from getting on a plane. So the very abusive nature
00:48:56.640
isn't a bug. It's a feature. They made everything here abusive, invasive, punitive, embarrassing
00:49:02.640
on purpose for the reason you suggest it to intimidate, to intimidate.
00:49:07.600
And add one more thing. Two days after they did this, February 15th, two days after February 15th,
00:49:15.360
February 17th, they arrested Tamara Leach and Chris Barber. Right, right.
00:49:20.320
And put them in solitary confinement on a concrete slab. Yeah.
00:49:25.760
You know, I've had a chance to get to know Tamara Leach a little bit over the last year,
00:49:28.480
we published her book and we're helping to crowd fund through the democracy fund her,
00:49:33.200
her legal bills. And I have to say that what she was put through is absolutely dictionary
00:49:38.880
definition, political prisoner. Absolutely. And even the way they're proceeding on the trial,
00:49:45.120
that trial shouldn't have even proceeded. If it did proceed, it's a half day trial. The fact that
00:49:49.200
they're stretching it months and months, they're still abusing process. They are still abusing the
00:49:54.960
process. And I certainly hope that her judge sees through it. And I have an optimistic feeling in
00:49:59.280
my bones. Let me get back to your lawsuit. Cause of action number five, the government of Canada,
00:50:04.160
via its public officials committed the tort of misfeasance of public office. Now that sounds old
00:50:11.200
timey. That sounds like an old time common law for misfeasance is a word you don't hear that often.
00:50:17.840
It's when a government official elected or otherwise uses their powers for an improper
00:50:26.640
purpose where they, they almost gloatingly take advantage of their power. They use it in an abusive
00:50:36.640
way with a, with a, with a harmful and malignant intent. And it's pretty rare. Duplessis was the classic
00:50:46.880
case we learned Ezra in law school and administrative law about abuse of power. Right. And, and this is
00:50:53.520
it. This is, this is it. This, this, the facts of the conduct of the government of Canada towards its
00:51:01.360
citizens exercising their charter rights of peaceful process and civil disobedience is just so off the
00:51:08.160
scale that these rare torts that we studied in, in law school, um, 30 years ago fit.
00:51:16.800
Yeah. You know, that's that you're so right. I remember that case. You mentioned Duplessis was the name of the
00:51:22.720
premier of Quebec. The case was called Ron Corelli versus Duplessis. Ron Corelli, if I recall, was a local
00:51:28.000
tavern owner who really frustrated. Was Duplessis the mayor of Montreal, not the premier at the time?
00:51:32.800
I think it was. Oh, you know what? Thanks very much. Thank you. That's okay. It's 30 years. That's why
00:51:37.600
you're a better lawyer than, than I was. Uh, he was frustrated because this guy Ron Corelli kept
00:51:43.040
providing bail money for, if I recall, was Jehovah's witnesses. And, and. That's correct.
00:51:46.720
He didn't like the JWs one bit. And, but he was frustrated that this guy Ron Corelli
00:51:51.200
was giving them the dough. And so if I recall, and you correct me again, because I'm worried now that
00:51:55.920
I'm not remembering the case properly, that, um, Duplessis said, well, you're not getting a liquor license for your
00:52:00.720
tavern anymore. Correct. And it was obviously for this political reason. And the case went all the
00:52:07.520
way to the Supreme Court. And again, I'm relying on you to correct my errors. Uh, and the Supreme Court
00:52:11.440
said, no, you cannot use the powers of the government for a collateral purpose. You just can't do that.
00:52:17.600
You, you, you can't make a decision on his liquor license because you don't like Jehovah's witnesses.
00:52:22.800
And I think of that case a lot because I think that, um, too often government decisions are made for
00:52:29.280
punitive reasons. I feel rebel news is frankly being targeted a little bit that way, but absolutely.
00:52:34.400
We saw the public order inquiry commission, the desperate express attempts by politicians to
00:52:42.720
condemn and demonize and just get the result we need. We need to hurt these people. I don't,
00:52:49.360
it was so obvious. And yeah, I, I look forward to the misfeasance, uh, toward being revived.
00:52:55.760
I got to skip ahead to the end. Sure. Remedies sought by the plaintiffs against the government
00:53:03.600
of Canada. Judgment against the government of Canada in favor of each of the plaintiffs,
00:53:10.240
plus such further or other amounts as may be proven at trial of this matter, including
00:53:16.080
damages for the violation of their Section 8 Charter of Rights, $275,000. General damages for their
00:53:24.080
economic interference, $100,000. General damages for abusive process, $200,000. For intimidation,
00:53:36.240
$300,000. For misfeasance in public office, $200,000. Aggravated and exemplary damages, as in to
00:53:44.800
make an example, $300,000. Punitive damages for any all or a combination of causes herein,
00:53:53.280
$1 million. And I added this up just in the back of a napkin, $2.375 million dollars per plaintiff.
00:54:03.840
if Omar Khadr can get $10.5 million, $2.375 million dollars for the way Tamara Leach was treated,
00:54:11.680
may sound like a large number, but frankly, I don't think it's a large number. For someone to be
00:54:16.720
arrested, humiliated, jailed for 49 days, put through the outrages that she has, let alone all
00:54:22.400
the things documented in this lawsuit, I think $2.375 million dollars is not outrageous. And I look
00:54:28.560
forward to this matter proceeding. I look forward to the documents that this lawsuit elicits in the
00:54:35.840
discovery process. I look forward to whatever testimony is compelled, if possible, in this.
00:54:41.920
I look forward to not only the result of this litigation, I look forward to the process
00:54:47.760
of this litigation. And maybe the table is turned, and maybe now the government must be put through an
00:54:53.200
excruciating process to explain themselves. I look forward to this lawsuit, and I'm delighted
00:54:58.240
that you've drafted it. And I'm so glad Tamara Leach and her husband, Duane, are amongst the
00:55:01.600
plaintiffs. And I'm glad it was done before the two-year limit. And I'm glad it was done in a
00:55:06.080
multiple of provinces. And I think this is an excellent lawsuit, and I invite our viewers to
00:55:10.160
look through it. And I'm glad you're doing it, Keith.
00:55:12.720
Well, thank you, Ezra. This is an important step for Canadians to start one step at a time,
00:55:20.960
Well, I have enjoyed this very much. Maybe it's because I'm a former lawyer myself. And I remember
00:55:26.000
learning in torts class some of these more obscure cases, like Ron Carelli and Duplessis,
00:55:30.880
which you don't hear about a lot because you like to think those bad old days of corruption
00:55:35.840
are gone. But we saw the worst of it two years ago. Our guest this past hour has been Keith Wilson,
00:55:42.320
KC. That's King's Counsel, a lawyer in Northern Alberta who is the lawyer for plaintiffs.
00:55:48.320
And if I heard him right, four different provinces. Is that right? Four provinces.
00:55:52.160
That's correct. And I'm glad about it. Let's see what judges across the country think of this.
00:55:57.280
Keith, good luck. And please let us know when next phases of this lawsuit happen,
00:56:03.520
when the government files a statement of defense, when you get disclosure of documents,
00:56:08.800
if you're at liberty to share them publicly. I think we'd like to follow this every step of
00:56:12.960
the way as we followed some of your other litigation over the last two years. So thanks
00:56:16.960
very much for joining us today. Thank you, Ezra.
00:56:20.240
All right. There you have a Keith Wilson. That's our show for today. Until tomorrow,
00:56:25.440
on behalf of all of us here at Rebel World Headquarters, to you at home, good night.