Alberta’s ethics commissioner says Smith breached Conflicts of Interest Act | CBC News

Alberta’s ethics commissioner says Danielle Smith, in her capacity as premier, contravened the Conflicts of Interest Act in her interactions with the minister of justice and attorney general in relation to criminal charges faced by Calgary street preacher Artur Pawlowski.

“In the whole scheme of things, it is a threat to democracy to interfere with the administration of justice,” Alberta Ethics Commissioner Marguerite Trussler wrote in her report.

In January, CBC News reported that a staffer in Smith’s office had sent a series of emails to the Alberta Crown Prosecution Service, challenging prosecutors’ assessment and direction on cases stemming from the Coutts border blockades and protests. 

Later that month, CBC News reported that Smith pressured Justice Minister Tyler Shandro and his office to intervene in COVID-related court cases, according to multiple sources familiar with the interactions. 

Smith would ask for updates on cases or inquire whether it was possible to abandon them, specifically including the prosecution of Artur Pawlowski, a pastor who was then facing charges of two counts of criminal mischief and a charge under Alberta’s Critical Infrastructure Defence Act related to the Coutts border blockade.

In March, CBC News reported on a leaked call on which Smith spoke to Pawlowski just weeks before his criminal trial, in which she said she had already been having “almost weekly” communication with justice department officials.

In a statement posted to Twitter, Smith wrote that the “CBC and NDP had repeatedly lied to Albertans for months” about Smith’s office contacting Crown prosecutors regarding COVID-19 prosecutions.

In regards to her contact with Shandro and his office, Smith said she “had always stated she wanted to find a path for amnesty for those charged with non-violent COVID-related offences and violations during the pandemic.”

“As I have explained before, I spoke with Minister Shandro, who is an experienced lawyer (I am not) as I was very interested in his advice on what could be legally done about this,” she wrote.

Of the 85 requests for investigations sent to Trussler in 2021-2022, she only conducted one probe, according to the commissioner’s last annual report. That investigation centered around Education Minister Adriana LaGrange, and cleared her of inappropriate conduct tied to a $150,000 contract for students’ reusable masks granted by her ministry to a company in her Red Deer riding.

Some of Trussler’s investigations were completed within a month, but typically, the commissioner took between three and eight months. The premier’s office said the investigation had been launched last month.

Read the full report here.

More to come.