Juno News - Did a crime happen in the SNC-Lavalin scandal？

00:00:00.000 So there's a conversation going on right now

00:00:07.320 about should Jody Wilson-Raybould be allowed to speak

00:00:10.480 in the committee hearing coming up this Wednesday.

00:00:12.920 Having her second shot, her second time around,

00:00:15.880 to go and put forward her facts, her truth, as she calls it,

00:00:19.380 of what happened and all of that political interference

00:00:22.320 from the Prime Minister's office.

00:00:24.040 Andrew Scheer has a Let Her Speak campaign going on

00:00:26.640 and a lot of people are rallying behind it.

00:00:28.360 And at face value, I'm very much in support of it, of course.

00:00:31.680 She says she wants to come forward.

00:00:33.580 Jerry Butts, Michael Warnock, and Justin Trudeau

00:00:35.520 have basically said that she was a liar, 0.80

00:00:38.040 that she misinterpreted the situation,

00:00:40.360 that two people can experience the same event differently,

00:00:43.660 in Jerry Butts' words.

00:00:45.100 I am fully aware that two people can experience

00:00:48.460 the same event differently.

00:00:50.200 So if she wants another crack at it,

00:00:52.260 she should be entitled to that.

00:00:53.840 She should have that opportunity.

00:00:55.260 But what more is she going to add from what she already presented?

00:00:59.640 In her stunning 30-minute initial testimony,

00:01:02.220 she gave considerable detail for those 30 interactions

00:01:05.540 in person, on the phone, text message, email,

00:01:08.540 where she detailed all the different examples of interference

00:01:12.100 that her and her staff received from the Prime Minister's office.

00:01:15.840 For a period of approximately four months,

00:01:19.880 between September and December of 2018,

00:01:23.760 I experienced a consistent and sustained effort

00:01:27.140 by many people within the government

00:01:28.940 to seek to politically interfere

00:01:31.180 in the exercise of prosecutorial discretion

00:01:34.480 in my role as the Attorney General of Canada

00:01:37.320 in an inappropriate effort

00:01:39.020 to secure a deferred prosecution agreement

00:01:41.540 with SNC-Lavalin.

00:01:42.980 I mean, what more are we going to get?

00:01:58.900 We're probably just going to get a second round

00:02:00.460 of he said, she said

00:02:01.560 that's going to muddy the waters even further

00:02:03.680 and Canadians might even get tired of it.

00:02:05.700 They might get news fatigue and go,

00:02:07.240 yeah, I don't know,

00:02:08.020 call me when there's a resolution in all of this.

00:02:10.420 And is there going to be a resolution?

00:02:11.920 I think a lot of people might be under the mistaken view

00:02:15.080 that the Justice Committee is going to come up

00:02:16.800 with some sort of verdict or edict

00:02:18.640 or they will press charges.

00:02:20.420 No way, that is not what House of Commons committees do at all.

00:02:24.300 All they do is write a report

00:02:25.720 and then the report,

00:02:26.700 they summarize what the different witnesses said

00:02:28.680 and then they offer their own recommendations,

00:02:30.960 8 or 10 or 12 or what have you.

00:02:33.420 They're not going to be saying much.

00:02:35.420 Probably the most aggressive recommendation they'll have is,

00:02:38.000 well, in the future,

00:02:38.660 you should consider separating the Attorney General

00:02:40.860 and the Justice Minister post

00:02:42.500 so we no longer have this situation again,

00:02:45.020 this sort of problem.

00:02:46.520 But that's not what we want to know.

00:02:48.180 We don't want to know what do we do moving forward

00:02:50.540 so this doesn't happen again.

00:02:52.060 We want to know,

00:02:53.240 did a crime happen?

00:02:54.820 Was there obstruction of justice?

00:02:57.260 And something dawned on me the other week.

00:02:59.560 I was appearing on a television panel

00:03:01.160 and there were a couple lawyers on the panel with me

00:03:03.100 and we were all getting into this big debate

00:03:05.100 over some of the very nitty-gritty legal aspects.

00:03:08.160 And I looked at it and I stepped back for a second

00:03:09.900 and I thought,

00:03:10.500 this is like a dress rehearsal for a trial.

00:03:13.760 I mean, I'm not a lawyer,

00:03:14.600 but here's these other two lawyers.

00:03:16.400 They're arguing two sides of the coin.

00:03:17.920 They're bringing up their points and so forth.

00:03:20.000 I mean, you've got this happening on TV and radio

00:03:22.420 and op-eds all throughout the country.

00:03:24.440 You've got former prosecutors,

00:03:26.580 former judges,

00:03:27.520 lawyers stepping forward,

00:03:28.780 arguing both sides of the coin.

00:03:30.660 They're treating it like a trial.

00:03:32.100 And hey, here's a novel idea.

00:03:34.380 Maybe quit with the dress rehearsals

00:03:36.060 and actually do the real thing.

00:03:38.460 The main event.

00:03:39.720 This is about the legal details.

00:03:42.200 And people aren't sitting together

00:03:43.520 and coming to a conclusive answer.

00:03:45.460 So that probably tells you

00:03:46.720 this is something that needs a judge,

00:03:48.320 a jury to weigh in on.

00:03:49.680 The legal system.

00:03:51.420 So I support Jody Wilson-Raybould

00:03:53.300 going back to the Justice Committee for sure,

00:03:55.560 but that is not where the resolution comes.

00:03:57.800 A very serious question

00:03:59.300 as to whether or not

00:04:00.400 there is political interference

00:04:02.000 in our justice system

00:04:03.120 is a legal question.

00:04:05.160 I mean, heavens,

00:04:05.760 if they can rustle up

00:04:07.380 31 criminal charges for Mike Duffy

00:04:09.740 and he's acquitted on all of them,

00:04:11.560 you've got to think

00:04:12.620 they've got to be able to find

00:04:14.040 one or two or three charges

00:04:15.780 for these guys

00:04:17.220 and have an actual trial

00:04:18.680 and get to the bottom of it

00:04:20.100 that way.

00:04:20.900 You

00:04:34.460 You

00:04:38.400 You

Juno News - March 12, 2019

Did a crime happen in the SNC-Lavalin scandal？

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