Trial for BC Terror Couple Wraps with More Questions About Their ‘Crazy Ideas’

Recovering addicts John Nuttall and Amanda Korody, already convicted on terrorism charges last year, had their mental capacities thoroughly mocked once again in court this week.

In a courtroom exchange that would probably sound offensive to anyone with a visual impairment, a BC judge said even "a blind person" could have carried out the failed bomb plot at the BC legislature given all the resources and guidance offered by undercover police. Nuttall and Korody were targets of an elaborate RCMP sting operation in 2013 that provided the impoverished Surrey couple with clothes, bus tickets, cigarettes, groceries, hotel rooms, and the inert C-4 explosives used in the mock attack. In the final hours of a trial that will decide whether or not police entrapped the would-be terrorists, BC Supreme Court Justice Catherine Bruce grilled the Crown on the RCMP's conduct. "[Police have] taken them there, they've given them the resources, they've shown them what to do, they've told them where to put it, they've made the bomb for them, and then they've said, 'OK, it's right there, take a few steps, drop it,'"Justice Bruce said. "Now what you are saying is that's not entrapment." During the investigation, Nuttall hatched all kinds of impossible terror plans involving cow manure rockets, defunct VIA rail trains, and a nuclear submarine. RCMP told Nuttall and Korody pressure cooker bombs were "feasible" and "exciting" in effort to keep the scenario manageable, said prosecutors. They argued the couple acted on their own free will. Earlier in the week, Bruce pressed the Crown on mention of the pair's mental health and intellectual abilities. Bruce referenced one instance where the couple agreed they could willfully forget the name of their undercover RCMP accomplice if they were captured and tortured. "That is not an indication of a person who has a normal intellect," said the judge. Prosecutor Peter Eccles defended these wild ideas as the workings of "lone-wolf terrorists." He said terrorists wouldn't be terrorists without some messed up thought processes. If the entrapment decision comes in favour of the defence, the terror couple could walk free. That's expected to come down before July 29. Follow Sarah Berman on Twitter.