Alberta RCMP lay additional charges against two people in Coutts border blockade
Posted March 17, 2022 7:54 am.
RCMP have laid additional charges related to the almost three-week protest at the Coutts border crossing in southern Alberta.
Joanne Person, who is 62 and from Coutts, had already been charged with mischief and possession of a weapon. She now faces an additional count of dangerous operation of a motor vehicle.
A pickup truck drove through the blockade on Feb. 1 and headed toward oncoming traffic before becoming part of a head-on collision.
Related article: Trucker protest thins out but remains in place at southern Alberta border crossing
Mounties have also charged James Edward Sowery, 36 and from Flagstaff County, with assault with a weapon and dangerous operation of a motor vehicle after a large commercial vehicle drove at officers who had to run out of the way to avoid being hit.
Person and Sowery are to appear in court on March 28.
The new charges follow previous charges against 13 people after police found a cache of long guns, handguns, body armour, large amounts of ammunition and high-capacity magazines in three trailers on Feb. 14.
Police said the threat was “very serious” and the group was willing to use force if the blockade was disrupted.
WATCH: Premier Jason Kenney says the RCMP will remove the Coutts border blockade after police arrested 11 people and seized 13 long guns
Outside court Tuesday, about 20 people gathered in support of the accused who are still in custody and others who had been charged. Some were waving Canadian flags while others carried signs that read “Drop the charges,” “Scapegoat tactics are an abuse of the law” and “Truckers exposed Ottawa’s tyranny.”
Tony Hall, who found the group We the People YQL, decried “this effort to criminalize the Coutts 13 and treat them as terrorists and people who are so reprehensible.”
“It’s really ruthless the way the effort is to build up this image.”
Hall, a former University of Lethbridge professor, helped form We the People, which began as a group protesting pandemic restrictions. Its website says it continues to fight to preserve people’s fundamental charter rights.
