“No amount of hostility can justify making false statements to the police,” Special Prosecutor Richard Fowler said at the public hoax trial of former Surrey Mayor Doug McCallum in Surrey Provincial Court on Wednesday. of”.
“Overall, it’s clear that the nature of the complaint is that the stepping on his foot was intentional, in his words, after he was pinned to the back of the car,” Fowler said. Fowler argued , it was not a hit-and-run as driver Deborah Johnstone remained in the car park after an encounter with McCallum, who he claims she deliberately ran over his feet.
“Hit and run is very different from deliberately trying to hit me,” Fowler noted.
Fowler said McCallum had time to think and reflect on what happened within four hours of the incident. “He had time to make sure what he told police was accurate.” He noted that the 911 call was made more than two hours later.
“During those two hours, Mr McCallum went grocery shopping, talked to protesters and people who were collecting signatures.”
Fowler pointed out that the former mayor is not without sophistication. “Of course he is, he’s running the city.”
Fowler said McCallum used the word “pin” more than 11 times. He argued that McCallum made false statements to police “obviously in order to deliberately mislead them, knowingly to make someone suspected of committing a crime they did not commit.”
“He said she pinned him,” Fowler told the court. “That didn’t happen at all.”
Fowler said McCallum’s statements to police were not “just reckless hyperbole. In other words, they were not remarks on a whim, leaving no time for a quiet reflection on what just happened.
“A review of the CCTV footage makes it clear that Ms Johnstone did not commit any of the offences implied by Mr McCallum’s statement.”
Fowler told Judge Reginald Harris he needed to decide whether McCallum’s complaint was whether his foot was run over or whether his foot was deliberately run over after being pinned to the back of the car.
“If in fact Mr. McCallum’s foot was run over, in my respectful statement he deliberately took advantage of the apparent accident to deliberately describe it as not,” Fowler said. “In my respectful opinion, the only reasonable inference is that the elements of the hoax have been proven beyond reasonable doubt by the authorities. You can be sure that he made false statements, you can be sure that he was intentionally misleading. You can be sure that he let Deborah La Johnston is suspected of a crime she did not commit.”
Prior to this, defence lawyer Eric Gotthardy told Harris that “the main reason for the failure of the Crown case was actually that his foot was stomped on”, and suggested that McCallum’s attempt to prank in public was “ridiculous” of”. He asked for acquittal.
“Officially there is no way to prove that the accused conveyed false information to the sheriff,” argued Gortadi.
McCallum’s trial is in its second week.
He and a group of volunteers collect petition signatures outside the South Point Save-On-Foods store in South Surrey on September 4, 2021, to discuss the transition to policing.
After 13 years as mayor from 1996 to 2005, McCallum was sworn in by a judge on 5 November 2018, his fourth term as mayor of Surrey. Brenda Locke of Surrey Connect defeated him for the mayoral seat by 973 votes in the October 15 election. Locke and the new council were sworn in on Monday night (November 7). One of her campaign promises was to have McCallum pay her own legal costs in this situation, not Surrey’s taxpayer. Locke said she has instructed city staff to that end, “and they will seek advice from outside legal departments on the city’s obligations.”
The trial continues.
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Court Criminal Justice Surrey