11 found guilty of civil contempt for protests at Muskrat Falls site
Eleven members of the Labrador Land Protectors group have been found guilty of breaking a court-ordered injunction at Muskrat Falls.
Supreme Court Justice George Murphy handed his ruling down Monday via video link to those facing charges at the courthouse in Happy Valley-Goose Bay.
Murphy found 11 of the 14 people charged guilty of contempt of civil court for breaking an injunction put in place in October 2016 as protests at the gate of the controversial hydroelectric project reached a peak. Among its conditions, the injunction ordered people not to enter the work site or block access to it.
Some of the charges related to a five-day period during which a large group occupied the work site, while others were in connection to other dates and in some cases multiple breaches of the injunction as well as breaches of undertakings.
We lost the historic beauty of Muskrat Falls, that's what we lost and that means a lot more to us than any of these court proceedings. - Kirk Lethbridge
"The fact that there is and has been compliance with the Injunction for over two years and the need to promote Indigenous reconciliation are in my assessment relevant factors to be considered by the court when deciding whether to decline to impose a finding of contempt," Murphy wrote in a 50-page written judgment accompanying his verbal decision.
"However, in the circumstances of this case, when I balance those factors against the important societal goal of ensuring people understand the importance of compliance with court orders, I do not believe it can be said that to impose a contempt finding in any of these cases would 'work an injustice.'"
'Not the loss that concerns me'
Kirk Lethbridge, found guilty of contempt of court, was among those who occupied the site in October 2016. He also brought a copy of the injunction to a press conference where it was torn up by NunatuKavut President Todd Russell.
"People are saying we lost today but this is not the loss that concerns me. We lost Muskrat Falls, and that's a lot deeper cut than what happened today," Lethbridge said after the hearing. "We lost the historic beauty of Muskrat Falls. That's what we lost and that means a lot more to us than any of these court proceedings."
Sentencing recommendations will be heard Feb. 7.
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