Jul 19 - Petition filed for Wolverine's release
Jul 21 - Delay caused by prosecution withholding disclosures
Jul 21 - RCMP sent in at Gustafsen to improve NDP ratings?
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JULY 19, 1996
SURREY, B.C.. - Defense lawyers Harry Rankin and Manuel Azevedo have filed a petition in the Supreme Court of British Columbia asking for the immediate release of their client Jones William Ignace (also known as Wolverine). Mr. Ignace has been in jail awaiting trial for his alledged role in the Gustafsen Lake 'standoff' for eight months. The petition claims that Judge Dohm was in error in when he reversed the order of Judge W.A. Blair granting bail to Mr. Ignace. Citing no change in circumstance or error in law since the first judge's decision, the petition asks that it be declared null and that Mr. Ignace be released immediately. Subsequent decisions to keep Mr. Ignace in jail are also challanged in the petition.
At the time of Judge W.A. Blair's decision on September 22, 1995, Sgt. Montague of the RCMP stated opposition to Mr. Ignace's release on bail. Sgt. Montague was one of the spokespersons who handled the media for the RCMP during the standoff. Many of the RCMP's press releases issued at the time have been found to be either inaccurate or false according to RCMP disclosures to the court.
Justice Dohm reversed Judge W.A. Blair's decision on September 29, 1995.
The petition is expected to be heard in the New Westminster Court on Friday, July 26th, 1996 at 2:00 pm.
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JULY 21, 1996
SURREY, B.C.. - Defense lawyers expressed frustration at the prosecution's method of distributing disclosures during the second week of the trial resulting from the Gustafsen Lake standoff last summer. When RCMP witnesses took the stand, the defense was surprised to find that the prosecution had only provided the notes for the day that the defendants were arrested even though it was clear that the officers had been involved in the investigation from the beginning. One witness had even visited a previous camp member in early September at his home in Alberta and had been given information that would have ended the standoff weeks earlier had it been followed up.
When the disclosures were finally distributed, defense lawyers found themselves with 40 pages of notes to read during the lunch break. Defense lawyer Harry Rankin was forced to go through the notes page by page with one witness because he had no time to study them. Previous disclosures have shown highly publicized shooting incidents (such as the one on September 4, 1995 ) to never have occurred at all. Without all the disclosures presented to them in a timely manner, the lawyers are hampered in representing their clients; time is wasted and the court is not aided in finding out the truth. This lack of timeliness by the prosecution takes its toll on the all the defendants as well as the jury.
In a phone interview on Saturday, July 20, 1996 Mr. William Ignace who has been in jail for eight months awaiting trial claimed that the attempted murder charges against his son Joseph Ignace should be dropped because the RCMP's own disclosures show him elsewhere at the time the crime allegedly occurred. Other evidence was also brought forward during the pre-trial that Joseph Ignace was not even in the camp during the time in question. Joseph Ignace has a nervous disorder that makes the court process extremely difficult for him. His father is angry that the charges have not been dropped but instead a warrant issued for his son's arrest when the young man did not appear in court last week. When the Judge issued the warrant, Mr. William Ignace asked that his son be compensated for every day he has to spend in jail considering that the charge should not even have been laid given the evidence.
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Ph. (604) 251-1409
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JULY 21, 1996
SURREY, B.C.. - The first two weeks of the trial of the Gustafsen Lake (Ts'peten Defenders) showcased the poor memories of the RCMP witnesses who became vague when asked to name their superiors. On the second day of the trial, Cst. Ken Tassell testified that on August 17, 1995 he was asked to drive five ERT members from the Kamloops RCMP Detachment into the Gustafsen Lake area. Although he remembered the exact time (4:11 pm) when he picked up the ERT members and the time he picked them up the next day (at 9:15 am), he could not remember who gave him the orders to drive the team to the Lake. He also had no "direct knowledge" about the information he shared with the ERT members during the hour long drive. Equally puzzling as his memory lapses, this officer, who has been on the force for 23 years, chose these two days of August 17th and 18th (1995) in particular to not take any notes.
With the arrival of the ERT squad and the removal of the 3 native RCMP officers, tensions escalated dramatically at the site.
During the pre-trial hearing, two senior RCMP officials named in a Vancouver Sun article as having had major roles in bringing in the military before the 'standoff' began as well as forming the policy that led to the officers on the ground being given the green light to shoot to kill, declined to respond to a subpoena to testify and had to be ordered to appear by Judge Josephson. When they finally appeared the next day, the Judge delayed his decision on their request not to testify therefore making it possible for their evidence to be part of the trial.
As evidence mounts that the RCMP by using excessive force may have been the major cause of the 'standoff' that cost taxpayers at least 5 million dollars and lasted a month, it adds support to Mr. William Ignace's statement made in court on Monday, July 15, 1996: "I'm here because the NDP wanted to kill natives to get votes."