Southern Alberta's top court cases to watch for in 2023
Pandemic-related discord affected communities across the province and issues connected to government-imposed restrictions continue to make headlines.
In 2023, a judge will release her decision on whether Albertans' rights were violated by pandemic health restrictions.
At the Coutts border, four men are accused of infiltrating the blockades and protests that took place in February. Police allege they had more sinister intentions than blocking border traffic. The men will go on trial in June.
In Calgary, two trials are set to take place in September and October. One involves a man who was charged with organized crime offences in the weeks before his wife was shot and killed. In the second case, a Calgary man will go on trial accused of committing acts of terrorism in Syria before returning to Canada.
Here are some of the major cases CBC court reporter Meghan Grant will be keeping an eye on in 2023.
Pandemic restrictions lawsuit
PARTIES: Ingram vs the Province of Alberta and the Chief Medical Officer of Health.
CASE: A group of Albertans seeking to have the province's public health measures deemed unconstitutional.
NEXT STEP: Written decision expected in first quarter of 2023.
LAWYERS: Jeffrey Rath, Leighton Grey (plaintiffs), Nick Parker (Alberta government).
Evidence has been called and arguments have been made in the constitutional challenge launched by a group of plaintiffs, which includes two churches and a gym. The parties are awaitng a written decision from Court of King's Bench Justice Barbara Romaine.
Lawyers for the group argued their clients' constitutional rights — including limiting peoples' ability to gather for social and religious reasons — were violated when the Alberta government imposed pandemic-related public health measures.
But lawyers for the government argued the province was experiencing "democracy in action in the middle of the biggest public health crisis this province has seen."
Other cases, like anti-lockdown rodeo organizer Ty Northcott's, may pursue constitutional challenges depending on the outcome of the so-called Ingram decision.
Conspiracy to murder RCMP
ACCUSED: Anthony Olienick, 40, Jerry Morin, 41, Chris Lysak, 48, and Chris Carbert, 45.
CHARGES: Conspiracy to commit murder, mischief to property over $5,000 and possession of a weapon.
NEXT STEP: Trial starts June 12.
LAWYERS: Steven Johnston, Matt Dalidowicz, Aaron Rankin (Crown), Katherin Beyak (Carbert), Greg Dunn (Morin), Tonii Roulston (Olienick). Lysak unrepresented.
For weeks in late January and early February, border blockades disrupted the Coutts crossing in southern Alberta as protesters rallied against governments' pandemic-related restrictions.
More than a dozen people were arrested after RCMP seized a cache of guns, body armour and ammunition in trailers at the protest site, but police believe Lysak, Olienick, Morin and Carbert were plotting a more sinister end to the protests.
Two of the men — Carbert and Lysak — have ties to a group with white supremacist beliefs.
All four men have been denied bail.
Organized crime and murder
ACCUSED: Talal Fouani, Belal Fouani.
CHARGES: Money laundering, proceeds of crime, organized crime.
NEXT STEP: Trial starts Sept. 6.
LAWYERS: Danielle Szabo (Crown), Yoav Niv (defence).
In August, Talal Fouani and his wife were shot as they pulled out of their driveway outside their southwest Calgary home. Nakita Baron, 31, was killed. Fouani survived.
After the shooting, CBC News dug into Fouani's past and discovered that at the time of the shooting, he was out on bail awaiting trial on organized crime charges alongside his brother and sister.
The siblings were charged with money laundering and organized crime offences following a cross-border, $55-million drug bust involving Mexican cartels, according to police
Fouani's company, Fouani Equity Funds Ltd., was charged with laundering proceeds for an organized crime group.
A week after Baron was killed, a man with a lengthy criminal history was arrested and charged with first-degree murder and attempted murder.
Terrorism trial
ACCUSED: Jamal Borhot.
CHARGES: Participating in terrorist group.
NEXT STEP: Trial starts Oct. 3.
LAWYERS: Kent Brown (Crown), Pawel Milczarek (defence).
Jamal Borhot is accused of travelling to Syria to join ISIS with his cousin in 2013 and 2014.
RCMP investigated for seven years, working with both the FBI and U.S. Department of Defence. The cousins were ultimately charged in 2020 with terrorism-related offences.
Police also ran two undercover investigations between 2016 and 2020.
The trial will likely offer a rare window into a years-long police terrorism investigation.
In 2022, Jamal's cousin Hussein Sobhe Borhot pleaded guilty to two terrorism offences and was handed a 12-year sentence.
