The Stench Of "Justice" In British Columbia

Those activities back against a hollow, secretive, corporate pig-out called the 2010 Olympics, already involving misuse of police power and apparently partisan actions by at least one Supreme Court judge. (more specifically on that later). On March 29, 2007, in late evening, Vancouver police invaded the property of the Downtown Eastside Residents Assoc. The Association works (carefully) for justice and fair dealing among the homeless and dispossessed. Vancouver police “raided” its property, looking, it said, for a stolen Olympic flag already announced as stolen by a “Native Warriors Society” wholly unconnected to DERA. “DERA executive director Kim Kerr labeled the raid an attempt to intimidate organizations that oppose the Olympic games.” (Vanc. Sun Mar 31 O7 B1 B8) Which judge signed the search warrant and upon what information? Judges of the Supreme Court, dragged into anti-2010 Olympic activities, throw a bright spotlight onto the Court. They open up serious questions about the Court’s (overall) legitimacy, partisanship, active bias, and subservience to the wishes of apparently corrupt politicians and corporations. A brilliant example: the proceedings in the Supreme Court of B.C. (before Chief Justice C.J. Brennen) launched by the District of Kitimat and Mayor Wozney to protect the town, previous contracts with Alcan, and B.C. control of the Nechako River power potential all expose the sewer of interests at work to destroy B.C. civil society. Put simply, the Gordon Campbell government, destroying publicly-owned BC Hydro, handing off the multi-trillion dollar river energy rights of B.C. to dangerous U.S. operatives – secretly, fraudulently, and by the use of gag legislation – is also trying to hand the Nechako River, a limitless cash cow, to Alcan. Gordon Campbell was very recently prevented by the B.C. Utilities Commission from granting to Alcan close to 1400% profit on electric power sales to BC Hydro. BCUC declared the intended sale to be against the interests of the people of B.C. [Note that.] Swim in the sewer of the Kitimat court procedure with me for just a moment. The action to protect Kitimat, its residents, former contracts with Alcan, and the control of B.C. rivers by British Columbians was opposed by Alcan AND by the government of British Columbia. The government of B.C. in the name of the Minister of Mines and Resources and in the name of the Attorney General of B.C. worked against British Columbians on behalf of a huge, private, foreign corporation. Judge on the case, Chief Justice C.J. Brenner, was very recently an active associate of Wally Oppal, Attorney General of B.C. Oppal, defying judicial propriety and even ordinary discretion, leapt from a position as Appeals Court judge to political candidacy for and a cabinet position in Campbell’s scandal-ridden government. The Chief Justice did not comment negatively – as he should have done – on Oppal’s indiscretion. To underscore their closeness, the Attorney General’s office supplies “registry and trial support for the Supreme Court”. And so Chief Justice (The Honourable) C. J. Brenner sat on a case in which his very recent judge-colleague was named as a principal. And the Chief Justice came up with a decision I consider a tissue of expediencies, all of which happen to serve the stated interests of Wally Oppal, Attorney General, and – I believe – constitute a gross misreading of the key and core matters in the Kitimat dispute. Chief Justice Brenner brushes aside the key and core matters as irrelevant or nonexistent. Key matters, he writes, are whether the 1997 and 2002 Orders in Council (in effect) break contract in permitting power sales by Alcan. Brenner, I believe, simply manoeuvres data to provide the answers he wants. Key and core matters that he cannot mask are two – and related. The overwhelming purpose of negotiations and agreements was (a) to develop industry and the economy of B.C. and (b) to do that (repeated and repeated) “on behalf of the people of B.C.”, “in the best interest of the Province”. Would it be fair to say that only a gibbering idiot or someone with malign intentions could pretend that giving away billions of dollars worth of water energy to a foreign corporation to sell outside B.C. and, thereby, to contribute to the ever-increasing cost of water energy to British Columbians is (a) “in the best interest of the Province” or (b) in fulfillment of an intention to develop industry and the economy of B.C.? The decision by Chief Justice C.J. Brenner, in my opinion, is built upon an intolerable conflict of interest, upon a false reading of history, and upon an apparent desire to serve the interests of the Gordon Campbell cabinet and Alcan. That is just one, huge indiscretion by a member of the B.C Supreme Court. I have, elsewhere, commented upon the imposition by Associate Chief Justice Patrick Dohm of a gag order upon Criminal Registry in the Supreme Court of B.C. In effect, Dohm denies to British Columbians documents placed on public record that they must have the unimpeded freedom to examine – by every fair and just Canadian tradition and law. Madam Justice Elizabeth Bennett presided at the trial of what I call “the fraudulent investigation and trial of Glen Clark, premier of B.C.” Whatever may have been the quality of her integrity in that affair, she is now intimately implicated in that series of events – the integrity of which is more and more questioned by reasonable and prudent British Columbians. In her role as judge in the Basi, Basi, Virk, B.C. Legislature search warrant “raids” process, her actions are and have been, in my opinion, unsatisfactory. They take place in a Supreme Court willing to jail a 78 year old environmental protester for ten months to punish her for “violating” a court order. They take place in a Supreme Court willing to send a sick, old Native environmental protester to an unsuitable jail – and to her death – for refusing to bow to the court’s will. Madam Justice Elizabeth Bennett has sat for (literally) years while Defence counsel has sought evidence from the RCMP, the Special Crown Prosecutor, the B.C. government, and the federal Justice Department. She has not once named any of the obstructing parties delinquent. She has not once made court orders and cited obstructionists with contempt of court. She sits, even now it would seem, an idle on-looker as the course of justice is frustrated. Why does she not treat those who are blocking evidence, who are failing to provide what has been asked for in the way that Betty Krawczyk and Harriett Nahanee have been treated? That question must be answered. Most saddening of all the Supreme Court fumblings of justice is the action by Madam Justice Brenda Brown to confine Harriett Nahanee in an unsuitable place of detention where, in the power of the court, she sickened, was taken to hospital, and died. So egregious was the indiscretion of Madam Justice Brown that a number of people have registered a complaint with the Canadian Judicial Council, wishing to see Madam Justice Brown removed from the bench. The matter occurred in relation to environmental protection, to the 2010 Olympic pig-out by private corporations, to the Gordon Campbell clique assault on responsible, democratic freedoms, and to police activity undertaken to quell reasonable public protest and (in the Basi, Basi, Virk case) to frustrate the course of justice. Clearly “normal (and sacred) defences of the person and of tranquil society are speedily being stripped away in British Columbia”. For that reason a copy of the letter to the Canadian Judicial Council follows. Page One 520 Salsbury Drive. Vancouver, B.C., V5L 3Z7, March 26, 2007 The Canadian Judicial Council, ATTN: Jeannie Thomas, Place de ville B, 112 Kent Street, Suite 450, Ottawa, Ontario, K1A 0W8 To the Councillors: The undersigned Canadians are using this letter to you to file a formal complaint with the Canadian Judicial Council about the actions of Madam Justice Brenda Brown of the British Columbia Supreme Court. We wish to see clear evidence of investigation. And we wish to receive a formal report from The Canadian Judicial Council of its findings and the actions which you will take. Our complaint concerns the treatment by Madam Justice Brenda Brown of a Native protester, Harriett Nahanee -Tseboilt (hereafter named Harriett Nahanee) whom Madam Justice Brenda Brown caused to be incarcerated in a detention place known to be unsuitable after being directly informed of the Native woman’s age and perilous ill-health. After some days imprisonment in what was described in court to Madam Justice Brown as a “hell hole”, Harriet Nahanee had to be rushed to hospital with life-threatening illness from which she died. She was first arrested on May 25, we believe, “along with 20 others who “refused to comply with” an enforcement order concerning resistance by members of the public to forest clearing and road-making in West Vancouver in preparation for the 2010 Winter Olympics. Harriett Nahanee died in St. Paul’s Hospital in Vancouver on February 25, 2007. Page two It is not our place to say that Madam Justice Brenda Brown was an accessory in the induced death of Harriett Nahanee. That will be for the Canadian Judicial Council to say. We do believe strongly, however, that – at the very least – Madam Justice Brenda Brown should be removed from the bench. We expect (1) that the Canadian Judicial Council will interview Betty Krawczyk (presently incarcerated) who actively informed Madam Justice Brenda Brown of the condition of Harriett Nahanee. We expect (2) that the Canadian Judicial Council will ask from Madam Justice Brenda Brown a full report of her role in the death of Harriett Nahanee, and will make that report public. We expect (3) that the Canadian Judicial Council will investigate the degree (if any) to which Madam Justice Brenda Brown consulted and was guided by the agreement to hold the 2010 Olympics signed by three governments: the Canadian, the British Columbian, and the City of Vancouver. That document sets out environmental terms that may very well have been seriously violated by the West Vancouver (Eagleridge) road-building which is the reason for the events presented in this letter. Apart from the question of her fairness, balance, and impartiality in relation to an old, sick woman who died unnecessarily while held in the power of the court, how much did Madam Justice Brenda Brown refer to the substance of the Olympic agreement? Did she consider the large implications of and the reasons for a concerted and serious public resistance to the road-building? Or did she consider (in narrow service to the B.C. government and the U.S. road-building corporation) only the paper upon which the original court order was printed as she set it out. We have presented here the substance of our formal complaint, and we will be happy to answer questions from the Canadian Judicial Council. We respectfully request prompt and expeditious consideration of our complaint. Yours respectfully: [Proofreader's note: this article was edited for spelling and typos on April 2, 2007]