Rebel News Podcast - EZRA LEVANT ｜ An update from The Democracy Fund on the 2,100 Fight The Fines cases

00:00:00.000 Today, a special interview with Adam Blake Gallupo. He's one of the litigators at the

00:00:05.140 Democracy Fund, the Canadian Civil Liberties Charity. We'll talk to him about some of the

00:00:10.440 2,500, I thought it was just 2,100, 2,500 cases they're still defending of walk-down tickets and

00:00:19.560 fines and criminal charges. It's a fascinating and slightly depressing conversation, but it's

00:00:25.620 also hopeful because he's fighting the good fight. That's ahead. But first, let me invite

00:00:29.120 you to subscribe to Rebel News Plus. That's the video version of this podcast. It's $8 a month,

00:00:33.940 and we really rely on that because we don't take any money from Trudeau. We rely on you.

00:00:38.900 Go to rebelnewsplus.com. All right, here's today's podcast.

00:00:46.880 You're listening to a Rebel News Podcast.

00:00:49.180 Tonight, what's the Democracy Fund doing? How are all those 2,100 pandemic court cases going?

00:01:05.420 We'll have a feature interview with Adam Blake Gallupo, a lawyer at TDF. It's March 15th,

00:01:11.120 and this is the Ezra LeVant Show.

00:01:15.940 Shame on you, you censorious bug.

00:01:27.940 Well, as you know, our first client in our project called Fight the Fines was Pastor Arthur

00:01:34.400 Pavlovsky. It was very early in the pandemic, March or April 2020. I can't remember which.

00:01:39.740 And I saw this photo, this video of Arthur who does what he does. He feeds the hungry homeless on

00:01:48.440 the street. It was very early in the year because it was snowing. So these people were cold and hungry,

00:01:54.320 and Arthur was doing what he did, and the police aggressively accosted him, pushed him. And what

00:02:00.220 really bothered me is the cop, one cop pushed him and said, stay six feet away. And then the cop moved

00:02:05.740 closer and pushed him again, like the cop was being provocative. He was being a bully. And, you know, 0.93

00:02:12.940 no one likes a bully, but you're bullying a man, feeding the hungry homeless. I can't tell you the

00:02:19.200 feeling that washed over me of anger. And I know what we can do. And my idea was that we would crowdfund a

00:02:26.680 lawyer for Pastor Arthur. I phoned him up. We were casual acquaintances. I said, here's my plan. He said, sure.

00:02:32.400 I mean, what has he got to lose? That became client number one in our Fight the Fines project. Client

00:02:39.600 number two, you've heard his name also, Derek Reimer, who was arrested or ticketed for doing the exact

00:02:45.020 same thing three years ago, feeding the hungry homeless. Well, soon we had 10 cases, and then 50.

00:02:50.440 And I realized that fighting the civil liberties battles of the pandemic would be as large a business

00:02:59.040 as running the news organization called Rebel News Network. And so allies applied to the Canada

00:03:06.660 Revenue Agency. I myself am not a director and I'm not a staffer of the Democracy Fund. It's at arm's

00:03:11.840 length of Rebel News. But allies applied for charitable status for a civil liberties project

00:03:18.860 to promote and defend constitutional rights like freedom of association, freedom of mobility,

00:03:26.040 things like that that were infringed during the lockdown. So would you believe it

00:03:29.980 that the Democracy Fund has taken 2,100 cases in the two years since it really debuted? In fact,

00:03:42.640 it just turned two years old this month. 2,100 cases. Not all of them as spectacular as Pastor Arthur's,

00:03:50.600 but some of them have been. Well, we're out of the worst of the pandemic and the lockdowns,

00:03:56.480 although I still see people on the street wearing masks, and I still see panic fear doctors being

00:04:01.740 interviewed on the news all the time. It's still extremely difficult to get into the United States

00:04:09.240 if you are unjabbed. It's possible, but difficult. And there remain universities and other workplaces in

00:04:15.640 Canada where they insist on a jab to their disgrace. But the intensity of the moment has passed,

00:04:22.220 and thank God we're out of that and Justin Trudeau's martial law. But what about the 2,100 people who

00:04:29.100 got charged? Some of them, it was like a ticket. Some of them, it was a criminal charge. Some of them,

00:04:34.560 very complicated matters indeed. What happened to those 2,100 cases picked up by the Democracy Fund?

00:04:42.900 Well, the answer is that those cases continue, that the long arm of the authoritarian law continues

00:04:50.620 to prosecute those people. And I thought it would be a good time to sit down for half an hour

00:04:57.480 with the lead litigator of the Democracy Fund. The director of litigation is a friend of mine named Alan

00:05:04.780 Haunter. But the man who's in the trenches every day is our guest today. We have an army of paralegals.

00:05:12.120 We have three staff lawyers. We have other lawyers across the country. When I say we, I mean the

00:05:16.380 Democracy Fund. I'm a donor. I'm not a staffer or an officer. But Adam Blake Gallupo has been fighting

00:05:22.620 the good fight every day. And I thought, well, let's bring the lad in now to get an update straight

00:05:28.300 from the horse's mouth. Adam, great to see you. And before I go any further, let me say congratulations.

00:05:34.180 You and Alan and Mark and the paralegals have really helped bring balance back to our justice system

00:05:42.180 over the last three years. Thank you for that. Yeah, I appreciate that, Ezra. And I noted you,

00:05:49.080 you mentioned we've got over 2,000 matters. I can tell you it's now well over 2,500. I've had a

00:05:58.280 conversation very recently with our lead paralegal for Ontario. And she's given me an updated,

00:06:07.200 her updated numbers. And we're looking at well over 2,500 matters that we've been able to assist

00:06:14.060 people with. Some of these include, you know, just anti-gathering laws. Some of them people are not

00:06:20.700 six feet. Some of them are mask cases. Some are Arrive Can app cases. Tell me some of the other,

00:06:25.920 some of them are criminal charges. That's right. Give us a sample of some of the cases the Democracy

00:06:32.960 Fund is fighting. No, you're right. We've, I want to lay out there just to show that, you know,

00:06:42.720 our success, we have been able to save Canadians over $12 million to date as a result of our efforts

00:06:53.440 against these fines. With respect to, if you're, you know, we've got, we've got, as I said,

00:07:03.220 2,500. The vast majority there, Ezra, is our ticket related matters. Like you pointed out,

00:07:11.040 these are social gathering tickets that were issued during the lockdowns and during these mandates that

00:07:21.860 were implemented prior to them being lifted. But also we've got the Quarantine Act tickets that

00:07:29.140 we've been facing, which are border crossing, typically border crossing. We've got hundreds

00:07:37.200 of them in Ontario, obviously. 200, I can tell you, alone, as I've, you know, had carriage of them

00:07:45.700 alone in British Columbia. So this is something that we've been pursuing. I can tell you with respect

00:07:54.020 to the British Columbia files, we've received 100 withdrawals of the over 200 matters that we've taken

00:08:03.460 on to date. So as it stands, you know, I hope that gives our donors some confidence in the work that

00:08:12.160 we're doing and the effort that we're putting into these. We, we, we do have a, a good record of

00:08:20.040 success there. You touched on criminal matters. We took on at the outset, well, I guess, let's rewind

00:08:27.820 a little bit. We were there in Ottawa, the Democracy Fund. All three of our lawyers were there for six

00:08:36.320 days, during the, the protests. As charter scrutineers, we were there to provide legal information to

00:08:48.400 individuals who were peacefully protesting, and make them aware of what their, their rights were. Subsequent

00:08:54.880 to those events, as we saw, the Emergencies Act was invoked. The, the arrests were, were, were, were made in,

00:09:05.400 we can get into that, I guess, a little bit later, but there were a number of arrests made. And, and

00:09:11.640 we have retained, we have been retained by about 30 individuals, give or take, including our external

00:09:20.480 counsel for those, those, those arrests. And I should tell you, Ezra, you know, I don't want to drone on

00:09:27.480 too long here, but we've received seven stays to date. And one of, and one withdrawal, which actually

00:09:37.880 occurred this week, in relation to a, an individual who was charged with mischief and disobey lawful court

00:09:47.360 order for peacefully protesting in, in Windsor. He was facing 45 days in jail. We were able to,

00:09:57.460 through, through, through, through our efforts, point out to the Crown, that there was a lack of

00:10:05.600 prospect of conviction. And, and, and the Crown, ultimately, because of our, the strength of our

00:10:12.480 case, because of our efforts, was forced into a position to agree and withdrew actually just this

00:10:18.000 past Wednesday. Wow. Now you said so many things that I've been taking notes. First of all, I'm glad you

00:10:24.000 told me we have 2,500 cases. And when I say we, it's because I'm a supporter and a volunteer. I'm not

00:10:29.800 an officer or a director or an employee, but I have a great affection for the project. And, and I

00:10:36.300 believe in it. And of course, it's our Rebel News donors who have breathed life into it. So that's

00:10:40.220 why I speak in the first person when, when talking about it. But as, as I mentioned earlier, it is

00:10:46.280 an arm's length organization, separate board of directors, separate bank accounts, separate everything

00:10:50.660 from Rebel News. Now you mentioned 2,500 cases. That's incredible. You said that in BC, if I heard

00:10:57.180 you right, there's 200 cases, but a hundred of them have been withdrawn, uh, with, withdrawn. Did I,

00:11:02.540 did I hear that right? You did. You did. Yes. So, um, so that means that the, the police and the

00:11:08.040 prosecutors say, oh, we're not going to actually follow through with it. Is that what that means to

00:11:12.120 be withdrawn? Yeah. Yeah. That's exactly right. Um, so the tickets have been canceled, right? So, so,

00:11:19.420 so we were, uh, actually look and it's, and it's difficult because the crown is under, uh, no

00:11:25.560 obligation to provide you with reasons as to why a ticket has been, uh, withdrawn. They can just

00:11:33.780 withdraw. They don't have to give you any explanation. Uh, so it's just, you get a letter

00:11:38.740 one day it's withdrawn. They didn't say it's because it was too much hassle. They were worried about

00:11:43.220 losing. They didn't have the manpower to prosecute hundreds of cases. They, they realized that the

00:11:48.200 police overcharged and it was a foolish. So there could be any reason. What do you think the reason 0.81

00:11:53.040 was for, for half the tickets in BC to be withdrawn? Is it just simply the prosecutors have more

00:11:58.420 important things to do? Well, look, I, you know, I, I hope they do, uh, is, is, is part of my answer

00:12:05.000 to that question. I hope they, they do have more important things to do as these are federal

00:12:08.320 prosecutors. These are people who are charged with the task, the very important task of, of, uh,

00:12:14.480 prosecuting individuals who are, you know, trafficking in the lists of illicit substances

00:12:19.320 among other, among other things. Um, but when it, when it comes to, uh, uh, these, these particular

00:12:26.420 withdrawals, um, I have a hunch, uh, uh, Ezra and, and I, and I believe it is because, um, our, our

00:12:34.200 legal team here and specifically actually our, our litigation director, Alan Haunner, uh, was able

00:12:39.200 to point out, uh, the fact that, uh, a number of these charges were resulting from, uh, uh, violations

00:12:47.500 that predated, um, a, uh, a declaration made by the health minister. Um, it, it, it gets into a

00:12:56.320 rather complicated, um, area of, of law, but the order and counsel, just, just to try and give it a,

00:13:03.760 a very brief, uh, overview. The order and counsel here, um, specified and the orders and counsel

00:13:11.140 specified that the, uh, health minister that, or the health minister's delegate was to, uh, instruct

00:13:21.680 as to the electronic means that should be filled out when crossing the border. This electronic means,

00:13:31.320 uh, since, uh, since has been declared to be the arrive can app, right? So, um, however,

00:13:38.940 this was not announced, uh, as far as our records are concerned, as far as what I've, I'm seeing on

00:13:45.020 their website until November 26th of 2021. So all of the tickets that were in relation to failure

00:13:54.920 to comply on an arrive can app basis to November 26th, 2021, our position was these tickets are

00:14:06.100 bunk because the law is incomplete. You don't have a health minister or, or, or a health minister's

00:14:12.940 delegate stating that this law has been declared. So let me just pause for a second. So you're saying

00:14:20.640 that the arrive can app, which was this odious privacy busting, share the data with the world

00:14:27.020 health organization, malware, awful app, everyone hated it, barely worked, but mostly it was an

00:14:33.680 imposition. You had, you were forced to give your health info. You're saying that until that date,

00:14:39.420 November 26th, 2021, it actually hadn't been given the, the authorization by the health minister or the

00:14:48.100 delegate of the health minister that any charge before that arrive can wasn't an official thing.

00:14:55.180 It wasn't the government thing. It was out there. The app was out there. We've since learned how

00:14:59.320 corrupt the bidding process was to make it. So any charge before November 26th, 2021, the arrive can

00:15:05.280 app simply was not the law. So cops might've said, fill it out. Airport busy bodies might've said,

00:15:10.940 fill it out. The media might've said, fill it out, but there was no legal requirement to fill it

00:15:15.160 out until November 26th, 2021. So any charges before then are, are empty. Did I hear you right?

00:15:21.120 Did I restate it correctly? You did. You did. And you heard me correctly, Ezra. Um, that's our,

00:15:28.060 that, and that's certainly our position. Um, and so they've withdrawn a hundred of these cases.

00:15:33.780 We've had in, in numerous jurisdictions in British Columbia alone, I can state that as a,

00:15:40.000 as a matter of firsthand experience is it shows you that if you just stand up and fight and I'm

00:15:46.040 talking about the hundreds of people who said, I'm not like, I think a lot of people paid these

00:15:49.980 fines out of fear and out of fatalism, but for the hundreds who said, you know what, I'm going to

00:15:57.540 fight this. And the fact that they didn't have to hire a lawyer because the democracy fund was

00:16:02.220 there, that's great. But the fact that it was a flawed ticket. And if they just resisted long

00:16:08.240 enough to not plead guilty and not pay the fine, there would be that flaw that you guys found,

00:16:13.680 Alan Hohner or director of litigation, that is karma. I think that's wonderful. And I salute

00:16:19.920 the hundreds of people who said, I'm not paying, I'm fighting. And would you look at that? Anyone

00:16:25.200 given that before 20, uh, November 26th, 2021, according to your contention, which obviously the

00:16:30.880 crown must agree with if they're withdrawing these things, I that's, you know, the best way to win a

00:16:35.580 fight is for the other guy to run away. That's the best kind of win. Well, I, and I, I, I agree 100%

00:16:42.640 with you there, Ezra. I can't say for sure that that's why these tickets were dropped. Um, but you

00:16:49.000 know, I've, I've got a hunch. But that's your argument that gets them to withdraw. That's wonderful.

00:16:53.940 Now, thank you for that information, but let me ask another question because November, 2021, well,

00:17:00.060 that, you know, December, January, February, March. So that's 16 months ago now. But the case I mentioned

00:17:05.940 about Arthur Pawlowski, that was March or April, 2020. So we're literally 36 months, 35, 36 months.

00:17:15.260 Now that case is over. He won that case finally. But I think we have other cases at the Democracy

00:17:21.360 Fund that are two years old, two and a half years old. Some of them are almost three years old. And I,

00:17:28.480 I know from years ago when I was a lawyer and in practice, that there are different court rulings

00:17:34.080 that say you have the right to a speedy trial. You don't want this hanging over you. People's

00:17:38.400 memories fade. People have to move on with their lives. People can't have the stress in their lives.

00:17:44.660 You know, the government has some sort of duty to hustle things along. At what point,

00:17:51.180 you said we got 2,500 cases in the hopper. At what point do these start going stale

00:17:57.220 by the hundred? And at what point does the government say, you know, we haven't got around

00:18:03.800 to these in three years. It was a particular political moment. Can we please move on and

00:18:10.360 prosecute drug crimes instead? Or at what point can a victim say, you know what, you've taken

00:18:17.020 your sweet time. It's been two years, your honor. I want the case dropped because this is violating

00:18:22.360 my right to a speedy trial. At what point, Adam, is the government out of time?

00:18:28.760 Yeah. Well, I mean, that's actually an excellent question, Ezra. And that's something that we're

00:18:34.280 currently canvassing in relation to a number of our upcoming criminal trials. That's the Jordan 0.99

00:18:43.160 ceiling you're referencing there. It's, in most cases, you've got an 18-month window between charges

00:18:50.120 and the trial being commenced. A number of things can come up and interrupt that. That's certainly

00:19:00.860 an issue that we're live to, especially related to our criminal trials. But also with our ticket

00:19:11.460 matters, we do have a number to date outstanding tickets that our clients have received that have

00:19:20.820 not been pursued. And they do date back to 2021. So we have those currently, you know, sort of on the

00:19:34.380 back burner. It's just, it seems to be something, it's an administrative issue. And it seems to be

00:19:39.400 something that isn't being proactively engaged by the Crown. So at this point, as you rightly pointed

00:19:51.860 out, we'd be in a position where a charter challenge would be available to all of these individuals.

00:19:59.740 One thing that I did want to note, before we moved on from the ticket matters into criminal matters,

00:20:07.040 is that these ticket amounts are unusually high, right, for crossing the border into Canada.

00:20:14.900 We're starting at nearly $6,000. It's $5,750. And that's before we factor in the victim surcharge fine.

00:20:25.960 So a concern of mine, and a concern that I've had for the last 10 months since we've received these

00:20:36.500 files, is the chilling effect that this has on individuals who are wishing to reserve their

00:20:44.740 right to a fair trial. You know, if you're in a financially difficult situation, how can you risk

00:20:51.820 $5,750 at trial? And these are tickets that we, look, the vast, far and away majority of the

00:21:04.240 tickets that we've received recently that we're representing individuals on are these Quarantine

00:21:10.460 Act tickets. And they have a minimum, the minimum fine amount is $5,750.

00:21:15.120 Look, if we can compare this to an egregious speeding ticket, right? If you look at, if you look at a

00:21:23.920 speeding ticket for 150, let's say 100, you're doing 150 in a hundred zone or 160 in a hundred zone on

00:21:30.860 the, you're, you're, you're on the highway. You're looking at about a $500 fine, $500, $500.

00:21:38.080 Okay. If you're going, you're doing 50 kilometers over the speed limit, 150. I don't even know if my

00:21:44.860 car could get up to 150, you would start to mine. That's so fast. That's like auto bond fast. And

00:21:52.140 that's 500 bucks, but coming across the border and not wanting to tell Justin Trudeau your intimate

00:21:56.700 health details, 10 times that. This is exactly it. This is exactly it. You can even take it to

00:22:03.800 impaired driving. You got a thousand dollars, a thousand dollars is the minimum fine amount for

00:22:09.780 a first offense for driving under the influence. Why, how I just, I, I'm very confused as to how this

00:22:17.600 is, uh, uh, at a magnitude of six, six times, uh, this amount, this first minimum, uh, minimum fine

00:22:26.980 amount of driving, uh, while impaired, um, for everybody who comes across the border who doesn't

00:22:32.740 properly fill out the, I think I know the answer to that question. And it was shared with me early

00:22:38.760 when there were so many awful things to travel. They had these airport quarantine hotels that you

00:22:46.340 had to go to that were thousands of dollars. And there was just really, there was no health

00:22:53.060 explanation. Like we had a reporter who went through one. He counted 14 different people he interacted with

00:22:59.480 before he got out. Like as opposed to just getting in his car and going home. Like, how does that make

00:23:04.900 sense? And another lawyer said, Ezra, that's the point. The government is trying to make these so

00:23:10.820 stupid, so embarrassing, so humiliating, so expensive, such a trauma that word gets out. 1.00

00:23:19.440 Don't even try and travel. Don't even try and leave your house. Don't even do anything 1.00

00:23:23.660 because the government is so malicious and stupid and mean and punitive, like that. The process was 1.00

00:23:31.460 the punishment and they were terrible on purpose. So I think that this trivial offense of not filling

00:23:37.640 out this government app, $5,750. So obviously unjust, you know, cruel and unusual treatment is what the

00:23:46.080 chart of rights would say. But I think that that's the point. The government said, how can we get people

00:23:51.660 scared? Well, just by being our worst selves, our most unreasonable selves, we'll find thousands of

00:23:59.200 people. But for every person we find, we'll scare 10 people into staying at home and locking their

00:24:04.500 doors and drawing their window blinds. I think it was mass psychological abuse, psychological

00:24:11.400 conditioning of the population. It was awful on purpose. That's my theory.

00:24:16.700 Well, and Ezra, to your point there, let's have a look at the type of people who receive

00:24:25.120 these tickets, at least in our experience. You know, often it's low income and working class

00:24:32.520 households, families with young children, single mothers, racialized minorities, and all of these

00:24:41.380 people are ineligible for legal aid certificates. So we've got a real, and a number of them, like, I

00:24:52.400 mean, look, we have, we had an individual recently, which we fortunately had a successful result with.

00:25:02.360 Two individuals, I should say, were facing more than $14,000 in fine amounts. They were in their 80s.

00:25:12.200 We were able to put to the crown, you know, prior to trial, and this was a few days prior to trial,

00:25:19.400 we were able to speak with them and tell them, look, I mean, what is the public interest here

00:25:26.220 in pursuing this? You know, you've got people in their 80s that are facing these tickets.

00:25:32.800 I don't know if you know any, you know, if you're, if you have familiarity, or if you have dealings with

00:25:40.000 people in their 80s, are they, are they people that are typically savvy with tech, new technology, and

00:25:45.940 technology, you know, by way of applications on their telephone? In this, in these sorts of cases,

00:25:54.620 and elderly individuals are not an uncommon theme. This is not an uncommon, uh,

00:26:00.020 individual. Yeah, if you don't have a smartphone, if you don't, there was a, uh, incredible case,

00:26:03.860 I think it was either a scout troop or a hockey team that they, they couldn't get on wi-fi in a

00:26:09.840 particular airport. So the whole, like, just, and it was an awful app. And yeah, you know what,

00:26:16.080 not everyone who's 85 years old has a smartphone. They might have a cell phone that's an old cell

00:26:20.600 phone. It was so abusive. But not just that, what's incredible to me is, you know, you get a $50

00:26:28.360 ticket, $100 ticket, that stings, you're upset about it. Maybe you complain to your husband or wife

00:26:35.400 about it when you get home. But a $5,750 minimum fine for not having an app. You know, how many

00:26:44.700 people in this economy are a paycheck or two away from not making rent or groceries? I think it's an

00:26:52.040 enormous, I mean, a $1,000 fine is probably a burden for most families. $5,000. That's, I'm just doing

00:27:03.080 some math in my head. That's like $8,000 or $9,000 pre-tax. That is like two or three months pay for

00:27:12.080 an ordinary family. That's enough to destroy a family's household budget. That's enough to cause

00:27:19.780 such trauma in a family about, you'd have to cancel your vacation. You'd have to cancel sports for the

00:27:26.000 kids. You'd have to skip getting medicine. You'd have to, this would devastate a family. And what's one

00:27:31.860 of the chief causes of divorce? Financial discord, financial troubles. These were family busters.

00:27:39.680 These, you know, I'm sure there were some rich people who just sucked it up and paid the $57.50.

00:27:45.180 But even, I don't, you'd have to be pretty rich not to notice $5,750. And like you said, I mean,

00:27:53.060 I remember one family, Democracy Fund case. It was a big family. They had a birthday party.

00:27:58.560 The cop didn't believe the family that was that big gave each of them a $1,500 fine. No,

00:28:03.760 it's just a big family. You're just stupid. You don't realize that. So you're charging the family 1.00

00:28:07.840 with anti-gathering rules. This is not a RiveCam. This was, you know, and it was, the family wasn't

00:28:13.120 even working. The family was on social assistance. I don't know how they were going to come up with

00:28:17.960 the seven grand or whatever for them all. I have no idea how that was even supposed to work

00:28:21.940 theoretically. I think this was just the government and the police abusing people to get word of mouth

00:28:28.160 going. Don't break the rules.

00:28:31.500 Well, Ezra, I've got a, yeah, you drive a hard point there. I mean, I have a hard, I can't, I can't

00:28:37.960 push, push back against that. Look, you've got people who are in debt. They've got, they're paying

00:28:43.660 off lines of credit with credit cards. Okay. They're facing these fines. Like you said, $5,750.

00:28:54.400 And that is before the victim fine surcharge, which in Ontario, I believe is 25%. So you're well over

00:29:05.020 $6,000 for these fines. So if that doesn't have a chilling effect on pursuing a matter to trial,

00:29:17.000 irrespective of whether you've got a case or not, if that doesn't have a chilling effect on whether

00:29:23.120 you pursue a matter to trial, I don't, you know, I don't know what does it. And I just, I have not

00:29:28.680 heard an explanation as to why the, uh, these, what, what, what, how was that number arrived at?

00:29:35.280 $5,750. You know, I'm trying to remember how much Justin Trudeau was fined for violating the

00:29:41.740 Conflict of Interest Act. I think it was $500 by contrast. Now, let me ask you a question. Um,

00:29:48.000 and by the way, that doesn't even like to hire a lawyer to fight it. You know, you hire a private

00:29:52.520 lawyer, uh, cause you say these are not legal aid eligible. Um, which again, why is that? Why,

00:29:59.580 why can't you get legal aid for these? Again, it's punitive. Um, hire a lawyer. That's thousands more.

00:30:09.680 Uh, you guys, like, look, if you're, if you're looking at a lawyer, I mean, you know, the, the

00:30:14.860 bare minimum here, especially if it's going to trial, the bare minimum would be $1,000, $1,500.

00:30:20.140 If you lose, you're looking at a thousand, $1,500 on top of the $5,750 that your ticket

00:30:29.980 lays out for you. So it's, it's, uh, it's, it's an amount of money that, that people just

00:30:35.720 aren't able to, to afford. And, and it just, just, just to emphasize again, it, it seems to be

00:30:42.640 working class, uh, people that were most affected, at least in my experience by, uh, these, 0.91

00:30:49.200 these, uh, tickets. Yeah. Oh, sure. I mean, the whole pandemic, I mean, I'm not a Marxist,

00:30:55.080 but the whole pandemic had a class structure to it. Um, some people had big backyards. Some people

00:31:00.060 had country cottages they could go to. Some people live in a small condo downtown without even a

00:31:05.300 balcony. Oh, go to the park. Well, guess what? They closed those. Oh, go to the gym. Guess what?

00:31:09.980 They closed those. Oh, well, Hey, just work from home on zoom. Yeah. I'm a waiter. How do I work as a

00:31:16.800 waiter from zoom? I'm a bartender. I'm a, uh, I'm a shopkeeper. Well, just shop is close. We'll just

00:31:22.560 buy from Amazon. Well, actually, uh, that's, you know, we, we double Jeff Bezos as well, but we put

00:31:28.900 out every mom and pop retailer. Well, go to church. Well, that's close. Well, at least the Walmart and

00:31:35.020 the Costco is open. So you can go there. You know, there was a classism to it. That's infuriating.

00:31:41.980 Hey, I want to shift subjects for a second. I know one of the things that happens when your lawyer

00:31:46.780 up, uh, the lawyer asks for disclosure, which is just simply a term for the government to disclose

00:31:55.240 what their evidence is. And they have a special duty to disclose exculpatory evidence, which is

00:32:03.440 the lawyer's way of saying they can't just give stuff that's embarrassing to the suspect. They have

00:32:08.920 to give stuff that puts, that might excuse, uh, the suspect too. So the police and the prosecutor

00:32:16.560 can't just give you what they pick. They have to give you everything, including the stuff that

00:32:22.000 shows maybe you didn't do it. So again, that's something I think, uh, a lay person might not

00:32:27.680 know to ask for disclosure and they might not know how to go through it. But when you and the rest of

00:32:33.200 the democracy fund team lawyers up, you ask for disclosure. And that's been an interesting thing

00:32:40.440 too, because some of the, some of what you've seen has been drone footage. Tell us about some

00:32:46.280 of the interesting disclosure, including disclosure that has managed to beat some of these charges for

00:32:52.000 people. Well, uh, you know, as a number of these are still live, so I don't want to go, uh, get too

00:32:59.840 far into the weeds here, but I can say, uh, with relation to a matter that was just withdrawn on, uh,

00:33:06.220 on Wednesday, this was a criminal file and this is in distinction, uh, from the, uh, the ticket

00:33:13.060 matters that we were talking about, uh, earlier. Uh, this is a matter where an individual is facing

00:33:17.720 45 days, uh, in jail along with a permanent criminal record. Um, and we were, uh, able through

00:33:27.500 pre-trial, uh, appearances, court appearances, uh, and several appearances before, uh, judge, uh, we were able

00:33:34.940 to, uh, put our, our case, uh, to, uh, actually in most recently, uh, earlier in February to a judge,

00:33:44.180 um, to the effect that, uh, the crown was, uh, put in a position where they had to, um, or

00:33:50.820 they didn't, you know, uh, I'm, I'm going to say that they had to withdraw. They didn't have to,

00:33:56.700 but, um, they, they were, uh, they didn't really have many other options. Let's put it that way.

00:34:04.540 Um, and this was because of, as you rightly pointed out, the disclosure, issues with the

00:34:08.940 disclosure. In this particular case, we did not have an arresting officer. Okay. So our, our,

00:34:16.840 our client came to us, uh, seeking help for charges, uh, under, uh, for, for mischief charges and charges,

00:34:26.240 uh, for disobeying a lawful court order. Um, both of these charges were dropped actually just this

00:34:34.080 past Wednesday. And, um, the, and, and this is due to the fact that, uh, we were able to point out

00:34:43.020 in, uh, flaws in the crown's case, flaws in the disclosure, um, such that they were not able to,

00:34:48.920 uh, make out, uh, these, these particular charges. It's, it's, I wish I could say that this was specific

00:34:56.900 to this particular case. Um, I can't, it's a problem across the board. Uh, and it's something

00:35:05.700 that we're, especially with trials looming, we have trial dates set now, and this is part of the

00:35:11.740 public record. So I can talk about it. We've got trial dates set now for the end of this year,

00:35:16.480 beginning of next year. We still have, we have, we are seeking, um, we're, we're not done seeking

00:35:25.180 disclosure. Um, we are canvassing what's called a stinchcomb application in, uh, with any relation

00:35:31.880 to a number of our files, um, uh, due to, uh, missing disclosure here. I wish I could, you know,

00:35:38.320 I can't really speculate as to why we don't have this disclosure, but I, you know, I, I'm happy to say

00:35:45.340 that, uh, I'm willing to say that it is, uh, necessary disclosure in order to proceed to trial.

00:35:51.820 All right. So you use some legal jargon there and that's fine. You're a lawyer, but I want to just

00:35:56.480 try and use plain English for a minute. So in some cases you're saying there's not even a cop

00:36:00.820 who's willing to show up in the trial. And of course, even before I was a lawyer, I knew

00:36:05.600 if you fight your, your traffic ticket at city hall, if the cop didn't show up, you were, you were in

00:36:11.780 the clear because there was no one leading the charge against you. The judge would just immediately

00:36:16.160 throw it out. And that was always a happy lottery moment. If you start, you know, if the cop was too

00:36:21.540 busy to make it. So you're saying that in some of these cases that you've been preparing for,

00:36:25.860 there's no cop involved, no cop is identifying and, and yet these cases seem to be slouching towards

00:36:33.260 trial. That's going to be weird. It is. Um, so I can say that they do have officers that are willing

00:36:41.320 to, to show up. Um, I, I, you know, in, in, in this case in particular, um, that we had just recently

00:36:49.940 withdrawn, there was an officer that was willing to show up to trial. The problem as well is that it

00:36:54.960 wasn't the arresting officer. So it's just some guy who's going to show up and had no first-hand

00:37:00.220 knowledge. What could he possibly say? He couldn't be a witness. He wasn't there. It's the definition

00:37:05.200 of hearsay. I mean, the judge would say, what are you doing here? What are you doing? That's just so

00:37:10.840 crazy. I think it comes back to what I said earlier, which is a lot of this was abusive policymaking.

00:37:18.560 A lot of these tickets were just like a PR move to scare people. Or maybe some cops were,

00:37:25.880 didn't know what the rules were or, or, or just trying to do something. Some cops I think are

00:37:31.160 bullies, but now things have sobered up. It's one, two, three years later. And again, prosecutors and

00:37:38.840 even police are saying, really, you want me to talk about that person I gave a ticket to two and a half

00:37:45.200 years ago because they didn't have a six feet separation. And you want me to take a half a day

00:37:53.040 out of my schedule and go to court so we can get this guy. So I can just imagine that unless you

00:37:59.980 were some extremist lockdownist zealot, you've probably moved on. And the idea of spending half

00:38:08.780 a day in court and, uh, is, is questionable. I guess cops get paid no matter what, but for a

00:38:15.100 prosecutor, again, they get paid no matter what, but they probably have something more urgent than to

00:38:20.200 do. I wouldn't be surprised if most normal prosecutors would want to just drop all these.

00:38:28.940 And if there's any prosecutions going on, it's probably some politician who's insisting on it.

00:38:33.900 When you say half the cases were withdrawn in BC, it makes me think that they realize they don't have

00:38:41.140 to do it. But other jurisdictions, you know, there's probably some lockdownist politician who's

00:38:47.160 shouting at the prosecutors, damn it, go after those people. Don't you know, they weren't wearing 0.93

00:38:51.580 their masks. I think this is so political. Um, and different parts of the government machine

00:38:57.720 want out and other people are sort of forced to stay in. What do you think?

00:39:03.860 Well, look, I mean, look, I can talk about the numbers we've got.

00:39:06.900 Um, you probably what looking at over at least over half of these matters are proceeding to trial.

00:39:14.800 So, you know, we, we've, um, the, the, we're, we're, we're finished with the preliminary work,

00:39:21.460 I guess at this point, but we still have, um, really the brunt end of, of, of, of, of the workload

00:39:28.640 is, is, is ahead of us. Um, the, the matters that we were able to get, uh, withdrawn have,

00:39:35.680 have now been withdrawn and now we're, we're, we're, we're looking at trial and again, that's

00:39:41.140 next year. We've got a number of applications we're planning on making in advance. I don't

00:39:44.840 want to get obviously into details with respect to those. Um, but, but it it's, um, yeah, as far

00:39:52.320 as, and then, and then I think you touched on the tickets there, um, uh, a bit it's, it's as far as

00:39:59.560 the, um, the, the, the, the public interest in pursuing these at this point, it's, you know,

00:40:08.080 and that's a little confusing to me as well. I, I don't, I don't really see what the public interest

00:40:12.420 is at this point. The mandates have been lifted. Um, but here we are. You know, I know there's two

00:40:18.120 rules for prosecutors. Uh, number one, is it in the public interest? And number two, is there a

00:40:24.440 reasonable likelihood of conviction? And I tell you, in so many of those cases, one or even both of

00:40:30.920 these are missing. Well, listen, Adam, it's great to catch up with you on all these things. Um,

00:40:36.660 there are other things that democracy fund does. If for example, it's not all defending tickets and

00:40:41.220 charges. You guys sent a lot of letters to universities that were trying to keep VAX mandates

00:40:46.560 for students or mask mandates. Uh, there's other civil cases, uh, for example, WestJet and, um,

00:40:54.560 Air Canada. So there's, there's, uh, other litigation afoot too. You guys are really busy.

00:40:59.680 It sounds like the hard work's just about to begin for you. That's right. Yeah. And, and just,

00:41:05.040 yeah, I can touch on, uh, some of the students, you know, again, these are, uh, another, uh,

00:41:11.900 instance of vulnerable population, uh, vulnerable population who's facing, um, these, these mandates.

00:41:19.180 I understand that it's, it's, uh, you know, these mandates have been lifted and, and your viewers are

00:41:24.100 probably thinking, wait a minute, none of this, none of this should apply now. Well, these, these

00:41:28.820 mandates were in place, uh, previously and, and they carry over. It's the courts move like molasses. 0.96

00:41:34.440 So we, we've, we, we're, we're, we're dealing currently still with, with students who have

00:41:40.640 incurred, uh, you know, obviously tens of thousands of dollars in loans facing termination of their

00:41:45.320 studies. Um, if they, uh, would or, or could not comply with, uh, vaccine booster mandates. Um, we've,

00:41:55.020 uh, met with our, our legal team has met with hundreds and hundreds of, of, of, of students,

00:42:01.360 uh, facing life altering circumstances and have assisted. And personally, uh, we've, we've been

00:42:07.640 retained by more than 40, um, over the last 14 months. Um, uh, again, in relation to these mandates

00:42:16.580 that have been imposed over the last four, 14, uh, four, four, 14 months with, with post-secondary

00:42:22.380 institutions. Um, we were able to, uh, I guess as an, an example here, and again, very recently,

00:42:29.720 um, there was a, uh, a 40 year old, um, uh, racialized single mom who was facing the loss 1.00

00:42:37.920 of four years of education along with any prospect of post-graduate, uh, studies. Um, she couldn't

00:42:48.020 get an exemption, uh, to the vaccine mandate and came to us for help. Uh, and this was actually just,

00:42:56.280 you know, three weeks ago, uh, she reached out to us, Hey, uh, you know, I need some help with,

00:43:01.280 with, with respect to this. Um, we were able to, uh, send off a, uh, a letter to her school,

00:43:08.220 enter into negotiations with the, uh, on staff, uh, lawyer with the school and, uh, obtain an exemption

00:43:17.440 for her. So she has now gone from, I am no longer able to complete my studies to not only am I able to

00:43:23.640 complete my studies, but I am able to maintain my post-graduate, uh, aspirations. Um, I have to say

00:43:31.280 for that particular matter that the, the credit there goes to our, uh, one of our, uh, senior

00:43:36.420 litigation, uh, uh, lawyers, uh, Mark Joseph. Yeah. Well, that's great to hear. So it's not always

00:43:43.020 a ticket or a charge, but haggling with these authoritarian, bureaucratic, Kafka-esque sets of

00:43:51.480 rules. Universities can be the worst for that. Well, listen, Adam, I'm very proud of the work

00:43:56.340 that you've done. I, I think back three years ago to that first case of Arthur Pawlowski and I would

00:44:01.760 never in a million of years have thought that we would have 2,500 cases, a full-time staff of three

00:44:08.000 lawyers, four paralegals, and tens of thousands of supporters. And I'm one of them, tens of thousands

00:44:15.700 of supporters chipping in. I think the average gift is to the democracy fund is only around about

00:44:21.880 a hundred bucks. Amazingly, the democracy fund can issue charitable tax receipts, which of course

00:44:28.680 Rebel News could not do. That's one of the reasons the democracy fund was set up to issue charitable

00:44:33.520 tax receipts because it is charitable work. Defending people who can't afford their lawyers is

00:44:39.460 charitable work, not just to help that individual, but to defend civil rights. That is a noble charitable

00:44:47.320 purpose. You're doing a great job. I feel a lot better briefed and smart on the subject. And it's

00:44:53.880 good to know that the work actually, it's not just going on, it's about to hit its most important part,

00:45:01.440 hundreds and hundreds of trials. You're going to be busy and same with the rest of the team. So good

00:45:06.320 luck with that and keep it up. Thanks, Ezra. And look, I think we could probably do this again.

00:45:12.880 We've got a lot of work ahead of us, like you said. All I can do is thank the donors for their

00:45:19.080 very generous support. It's because of them that we're able to do this and get the successes. Look,

00:45:25.480 I think this is successes here speak for themselves. But that's because of our very generous donors.

00:45:34.080 Well, isn't that the truth? And folks, you can find out more at thedemocracyfund.ca.

00:45:41.800 And we didn't even talk about the work the Democracy Fund did at the Emergencies Act Commission of

00:45:47.200 Inquiry, where the Democracy Fund was accredited as an intervener. You guys were accredited as an

00:45:52.920 intervener in a court case in Windsor. So you guys are really doing important work. Well, maybe we can

00:45:58.800 catch up with you in another month or two, especially as some of these cases start to go

00:46:03.240 through a trial. If the prosecutor doesn't blink, I'd love to see how these go. In the meantime,

00:46:09.240 keep up the great work and thanks for your service. Thanks so much, Ezra. Thanks. Thanks very much for

00:46:14.000 having me. Our pleasure. There you have it. Adam Blake Gallupo, a litigator with the Democracy Fund

00:46:20.460 who works on the projects that took over the Fight the Fines project. That's our show for today. Until

00:46:28.380 next time, on behalf of all of us here at Rebel World Headquarters, to you at home, good night and keep

00:46:33.740 fighting for freedom.

00:46:34.440 here we go.

00:46:53.220 you

Rebel News Podcast - March 18, 2023

EZRA LEVANT ｜ An update from The Democracy Fund on the 2,100 Fight The Fines cases

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