Media Gives Up Court Battle for Document that May Contain Personal Information About Stephen Harper’s Family

This article originally appeared on VICE Canada.

A gaggle of Canada's biggest media outlets have given up the chase on a court document that they believe contains personal information about Prime Minister Stephen Harper's family and allegations of RCMP wrongdoing.

On Friday, a 30-day appeal period ended with the CBC, the National Post, the Toronto Star, and Maclean's deciding against appealing a judge's decision to keep the document sealed in order to protect the identity of a confidential police informant in a high-profile RCMP harassment case.

Their choice not to appeal means the highly-protected document will likely never see the light of day.

But the media attention on the secret document barely skims the surface of a case that involves allegations of sex work solicitation, corruption, and harassment by RCMP members, prompting testimony from the RCMP's top brass, including Commissioner Bob Paulson and Assistant Commissioner Stephen White.

The court case, which resumed in an Ontario court last week, involves layer upon layer of information under a judicial veil of secrecy that may reach the highest echelons of the Canadian democratic system.

The story begins more than a decade ago. In 2005, Peter Merrifield alleges he was harassed by his superiors because he ran for a federal Conservative nomination while still an RCMP officer. Merrifield claims that his superiors harassed him because they perceived it as a conflict of interest. His claims haven't yet been tested in court.

Last December, a witness, whose identity is protected by the sealing order, was called to testify for Merrifield. The witness, who was a confidential informant, submitted an affidavit that reportedly contained a series of letters. Those letters, the media outlets allege, "contain allegations about RCMP wrongdoing, including repeated information leaks that threaten the safety of confidential informants, and the leak of private information about Harper's family." VICE has a confidential source who also alleges that the letters contain this information.

The affidavit and letters were sealed by the court, and on April 30, Justice Mary Vallee upheld the sealing order she placed on the documents in December, ruling that the identity of the confidential informant who authored the letters and swore to the affidavit must be protected above all else.

"Disclosure of redacted versions of the materials and order would be meaningless because all the text in the materials and the order would have to be redacted," Vallee wrote in her decision.

In their written submissions arguing to keep the documents sealed, lawyers for the Department of Justice invoked section 37 of the Canada Evidence Act, which has previously been used in the case of convicted terrorist Momin Khawaja.

However, Vallee didn't mention section 37 in her written decision to keep the document sealed.

After Vallee upheld the sealing order, a lawyer representing the National Post, the CBC, the Toronto Star, and Maclean's explained that he had never seen the extreme level of secrecy Canada's justice department has insisted on in Merrifield's harassment case against the RCMP. "This is an extraordinary case," Brian Rogers, the lawyer representing the outlets, told VICE following Vallee's decision on April 30. "In all my years of practice in this area, I've never seen anything like it."

A month later, he stands by what he said.

Over the phone Friday, Rogers told VICE he couldn't say why his clients decided not to appeal.

"I think you can make a general observation that in tight financial times for the media, they have to make difficult choices on how best to use their resources," he said.

The appeal would have cost around $25,000, he added—though he hadn't done an exact calculation.

He couldn't say in what order the media outlets decided against appealing, but said they were unanimous in their decision. "It was a situation where we needed most if not all of them to join the appeal."

When the Merrifield case resumed May 19, VICE attended several days of the drama-filled hearing in Newmarket, Ontario.

During the trial, two of the RCMP's top brass seemed to contradict each other regarding what they knew of allegations that an RCMP officer tried to solicit sex work.

The apparently inconsistent testimony touched on an allegation Merrifield raised at a Senate committee hearing in 2013—that a senior RCMP officer had tried to solicit sex work. RCMP Commissioner Bob Paulson later testified before the same Senate committee and tried to discredit Merrifield.

"He was suggesting that his bosses have all harassed him and are cavorting with prostitutes," Paulson told the committee about Merrifield. He also told the committee: "Some people's ambitions exceed their abilities."

In December, Paulson followed that up with testimony at Merrifield's hearing, telling the court he had no knowledge of a London Police report that mentioned the sex work allegations.

But when he testified, on May 20, at Merrifield's hearing, RCMP Assistant Commissioner Stephen White first said Paulson would have been aware of the London Police report before his outburst at the Senate committee hearing.

Then, a few moments later, White seemed to contradict himself, telling the court he didn't know if he mentioned the police report to his boss.

None of the allegations of a senior officer soliciting sex work have been proven in court.

As for Merrifield's perceived conflict of interest that he says triggered harassment by his senior officers, on May 22 a government witness and former RCMP conflict of interest advisor, Wendy Verrecchia, told the court she thought Merrifield had a clear conflict of interest.

She said Merrifield asked her in 2004 for her interpretation of the RCMP's conflict of interest policy because he wanted to run for a federal Conservative nomination, VICE heard in court.

Verrecchia testified she told him he would have to take leave without pay while he was pursuing political office to keep distance between the RCMP and his political activities. She testified he expressed worries to her that it would be a financial hardship if he took too much time off.

In 2005, Merrifield ran for a federal Conservative nomination and lost. According to Merrifield's statement of claim, he did not take leave without pay. He argued he was informed it wasn't necessary to do so, and that it was a "protest" participation and he didn't commit the necessary resources to win the nomination.

Verrecchia testified she was concerned that at the time he was seeking the nomination, Merrifield was also assigned to investigate death threats against Belinda Stronach, who had crossed the floor from the Conservatives to the Liberals. If something were to happen to Stronach, it could have called into question the objectivity of both Merrifield and the RCMP, Verrecchia told the court.

Merrifield alleges his superior, Inspector James Jagoe, ordered an RCMP member to attend his nomination meeting, a private political event, to snatch some of his campaign pamphlets. Verrecchia said Jagoe approached her about Merrifield seeking the federal Conservative nomination, and his assignment to the Stronach investigation. She said he asked her whether Merrifield had run afoul of the RCMP's conflict of interest policy, and she advised him of what she had previously told Merrifield about the policy.

Her testimony might make a dent in Merrifield's case since the RCMP could argue there was no harassment—only discipline due to his conflict of interest. Merrifield's lawyers plan to argue that even if he had a conflict of interest, the RCMP didn't bring it forward under the proper code of conduct process and instead bullied him for his actions.

The case is scheduled to continue this week.

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