Rounding out this week’s public hearings as part of the Public Order Emergency Commission was the questioning of prominent “Freedom Convoy” organizer Tamara Lich, followed by testimony from a couple of protest participants and Diagolon’s Jeremy MacKenzie.
The commission then ended up with former RCMP officer Daniel Bulford, who helped with the security of the “Freedom Convoy” and had previously been on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s security team before resigning over the forces’ vaccination mandate.
From Lich being accused of having a “selective” memory when it comes to remembering the events that unfolded in Ottawa, to listening to the experiences of protesters, here are the highlights of Friday’s hearings so far.
LICH ACCUSED OF ‘SELECTIVE’ MEMORY
A notable exchange from Friday’s proceedings occurred while Lich was being questioned by an attorney representing the Ottawa Police Service. Showing Lich a police log from February 16 that indicated officers had told him to get out of town and share that message with others, he was asked if he remembered this interaction.
Lich said she remembers being upset.
“I think I said something like ‘I can’t believe you’re about to do this to your own people,'” he said.
When asked if she was crying because it was over and the police told her to go, she said she didn’t remember the police telling her she had to go. “It was suggested,” she said.
The Ottawa police attorney then said: “It seems to me that your memory is selective when I take you to something that involves you, you don’t remember it.”
Then Lich’s attorney showed up to say that was “arson,” and quickly the line of questioning moved on.
However, another case arose in which Lich’s memory was questioned while he was being questioned by a lawyer representing the citizens of Ottawa.
When Lich was asked about testimony indicating that he would “obviously” have followed a court order to leave, he was pointed out that when a court order against honking was imposed, his legal representation appeared in court to object.
“Didn’t you know that was the position you were taking?” the lawyer asked.
“I don’t remember that. But if you say so,” Lich said.
‘I WAS ALSO RECEIVING DEATH THREATS’
During cross-examination by an attorney representing the federal government, Lich was asked if he was aware of the death threats various political figures were receiving during the protests, before hearing testimony about it.
When first asked if he was aware that outgoing Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson had received threats, Lich said he didn’t know.
Asked if he was aware that former Ottawa Police Chief Peter Sloly had received threats, he said “no.”
“You did not know that Deputy Prime Minister Freeland had received…” the lawyer said.
“I found out about that the other day,” Lich said.
“And the prime minister was receiving threats,” the lawyer said.
“I didn’t know that. I was also getting death threats.”
EXPERIENCES OF ARRESTED PROTESTERS
On Friday we also saw a couple of protesters, not organizers but two people who decided to come and participate, offer the commission their experience of being in Ottawa and being arrested after the Emergencies Act was invoked.
First, this is how each described their experience of protesting.
Veteran Chris Deering: “It wasn’t really that I wanted to come to Ottawa, it was that I felt it was my duty and I didn’t have a choice [but] to be there. Seeing what was happening in the last few years was worrying…During the protests…there were homeless people who were showered with food. She had read that crime was down. It was the most amazing experience I’ve ever had in my life, and I don’t regret one bit of going or being there.”
Maggie Hope Braun, Peterborough resident: “There was a lot of energy. I was seeing people from all backgrounds and cultures, different outfits and, you know, cultural outfits that I’ve never seen in Canada before… There were grown men crying and hugging everywhere, and it was emotional, and we cried, we had spent a lot of time feeling like we were really alone, and not being able to go out and really not being able to even talk or share our experience at our family gatherings… It felt like this was our family… The positive male experience, the way the men behaved, they were complete gentlemen. [sic] And you know, I didn’t feel unsafe at all in the city.”
Maggie Hope Braun and Chris Deering testify at the Emergency Law Enforcement Commission in Ottawa on Friday, November 4, 2022. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld
And this is what they said about being arrested.
Deering: “I turned myself in to the police and when the police knocked me down and kneed me in the side, they kicked me in the back. I was lying down…I had my hands fully up and I was saying ‘I’. I’m very peaceful. I’m peaceful. I don’t resist. … My hands were tied. The officers slowly lifted me up and then we walked slowly to the processing line… I stood there in the cold for two hours. I asked the policeman who was at both sides of me and said, ‘Do you mind, do you know my condition, is it okay if I sit or kneel because I have chronic pain?’ It was obvious, my face was flushed and I cried several times, and I never cry. It was the worst pain…”
Braun: “There was a man who had the Charter, the Bill of Rights or, I guess it was a bill of rights. It was a document. They look the same and they both represent human rights, so I took three copies of that and it looked like there was three different police units… So I talked to each unit and said, ‘You may have been able to justify this up to this point, but if you keep moving towards the people, because we’re just the people, now that they’ve got the trucks, they’ll be trampling our Bill of Rights with their boots.’ And I put it in front of each one of them, and in the middle of the street I knelt in front of the Letter and I told the policemen that if they move forward, I am willing to not resist arrest and I will not move at that point. So that It was my line in the sand.”
MACKENZIE LOOKS TO MINIMIZE DIAGOLON
During his appearance before the commission, MacKenzie made repeated efforts to try to downplay or dismiss earlier testimony before the commission that Diagolon, a controversial online community he runs, is an extremist entity.
MacKenzie was in Ottawa for the protests, but he appeared via videoconference for his testimony as it is. currently in custody in Saskatchewan, for assault, mischief and firearms charges unrelated to the convoy. He said Friday that he plans to plead not guilty.
The self-described podcaster and comedian testified that while in Ottawa, he handed out business cards bearing the Diagolon logo, encouraging other protesters to check their online accounts. However, when asked by his lawyer if he thought that anyone who consumed his content would actually consider the group an organization, he said he wouldn’t believe it.
Reporters work like TV shows. Commission attorney John Mather questions Jeremy MacKenzie as he appears by video conference at the Law Enforcement Emergency Commission, Friday, Nov. 4, 2022, in Ottawa. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld
Asked how he would explain intelligence suggesting otherwise, MacKenzie sought to blame the Canadian Anti-Hate Network, “statements taken out of context” and the mainstream media, which he said have then been consumed by police and politicians. .
“It goes up the net until it lands on the desk of the public safety minister, or maybe even the prime minister’s office where they’re faced with these scenarios that have no basis in reality… It’s absurd,” MacKenzie said.
Among the evidence that has been presented to the commission is an OPP intelligence report investigating MacKenzie in relation to “extremism”, noting his involvement with Diagolon and other groups; as well as a heavily redacted CSIS analytical report on Diagolon’s involvement in the convoy and beyond, which makes no reference to the group’s “violent rhetoric.”
On Friday, MacKenzie testified that “I didn’t mean to see any kind of violence, political violence or anything like that,” because that would undermine the protesters’ intention to “peacefully demonstrate their discontent.”
BULFORD DETAILS SECURITY OPERATIONS
Bulford’s testimony on Friday focused largely on his role in regards to convoy security and his work as a police liaison. Bulford testified that he had regular communication with the Ottawa Police Service, the Parliamentary Protection Service, the OPP and the RCMP in that capacity.
“A lot of information was coming to me on any given day and so my main role, what I spent most of my time on, was sorting through information that could have been any kind of threat to public safety. Anything that I felt had any kind of credibility or something that might be beyond my power to verify, I would turn over to the police,” Bulford said.
He went on to detail how he established an operations and logistics support center and formed an incident command system, where he worked with “several” volunteers who had previously held first-aid positions, calling on police, paramedics and “a lot of firefighters.”
Daniel Bulford appears before the Emergency Law Enforcement Commission on Friday, November 4, 2022, in Ottawa. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld
When asked about some of his concerns from a security perspective, Bulford said his biggest concern was outside instigation seeking to damage the credibility of the convoy, or a “lone wolf or small group attack.”
Bulford, whose accounts were frozen, testified that during the protests he tried to calm the protesters’ anxiety about the increased police presence and noted that, in his experience, it was normal for an event of this magnitude in the nation’s capital.
When asked about earlier testimony from convoy attorney Keith Wilson, who suggested there were leaks from law enforcement because convoy organizers were aware of the police operations before they occurred, Bulford said:
“I have never had any active duty officers leak sensitive information to me. I did have several police officers, ex-police officers, ex-military who helped me with some of those different security tasks. And there were, I’m not exactly sure of the number, but there were officers who were on leave for various reasons… who were also helping with some of the security tasks that I was coordinating.”