Alberta
Conspiracy charges dropped, Chris Lysak, Jerry Morin released after agreeing to plea deals
From the Frontier Centre for Public Policy
By Ray McGinnis
” the Crown dropped conspiracy to commit murder of police, and mischief charges, against both Lysak and Morin. The Crown got a plea deal from Lysak and Morin on minor firearms charges. These charges the two pled guilty to were never part of the original indictment that prompted their arrests. “
Two of the four men at the Coutts blockade arrested in February 2022, accused of conspiracy to commit murder and mischief – Chris Lysak and Jerry Morin – are free men. They were released on February 6, 2024. They remained in custody in remand centres for 723 days. While in custody, Morin was in solitary confinement for 74 days.
After relying on legal aid lawyers with little results, in November 2023 Lysak crowdfunded for better counsel. His new lawyer Daniel Song brought a section 8 charter application to examine the Crown’s case against his client. Suddenly, the Crown dropped conspiracy to commit murder of police, and mischief charges, against both Lysak and Morin. The Crown got a plea deal from Lysak and Morin on minor firearms charges. These charges the two pled guilty to were never part of the original indictment that prompted their arrests.
Lysak and Morin are now reunited with their families and will begin the long journey to rebuild their lives. Both are fathers. Morin is a lineman and Chris Lysak is an electrician.
Lysak pled guilty to improper storage of a firearm which was properly registered under his name and legally purchased. The Crown also dropped charges against Chris Lysak for uttering threats.
Though the RCMP released a shocking photo of a stash of weapons around a table with an RCMP cruiser in the background, the majority of weapons on display turned out to have no connection to any of the four men arrested on conspiracy to commit murder charges. The RCMP photo was taken before Jerry Morin was arrested west of Calgary around noon on February 14, 2022. Morin was on the way to work for a rancher on a farm when he was arrested by a SWAT team.
These men were in deteriorating health and facing financial ruin. And the Crown knew this. Once they pled guilty to the minor charges, they were free men.
Dropping conspiracy to commit murder of police officer charges by the Crown is significant. News of the arrests was pointed to in the Rouleau Report as key to its justifying invocation of the Emergencies Act on February 14, 2022, by the Liberal government. Now that these charges are dropped it appears the Crown and the RCMP never had evidence to convict the accused of conspiracy to commit murder. Instead, they put them through gruelling custody in remand centres, hoping to break them. The decision to deny them bail for nearly two years was politically motivated. They were deemed too dangerous to be granted bail on one day. Then on the next they were released and deemed no threat to the public.
Lysak and Morin refused earlier offers to plea guilty. But after two years the strain of the whole ordeal led them to agree to a coerced confession to new charges in order to survive.
The plea deal was struck in a courtroom outside of the courtroom where the pre-trial motions were set to begin at 10 AM on February 6. The dropping of serious charges and confession to new minor firearms charges, and release of these two men came as a surprise.
A friend of Chris Lysak, Fort Macleod councillor Marco Van Huigenbos, said “723 days pretrial is a travesty of justice in Canada, and it has to be treated as such. There has to be a full inquiry into these prosecutions.”
Is all that is required to deny bail for those accused of serious crimes to argue that their release will undermine confidence in the justice system? The justice system is not immune from corruption or politicization. What confidence can citizens have in it? It appears lawfare is alive and well in Canada. The case of the Coutts Four shows that the Crown have the power to lay serious charges against citizens and let them linger for years in custody without bail or trial.
Is all that is required to make the Crown walk back charges of conspiracy to commit murder a smart lawyer who knows how to make a section 8 charter application?
On January 15 Chris Carbert was denied bail for the second time. The lawyer who successfully represented Chris Lysak, Daniel Song, is now being considered to represent Chris Carbert (along with his existing lawyer) at the upcoming February 20 court hearing. The remaining ‘Coutts Two’ – Chris Carbert and Tony Olienick – will be at that hearing. Olienick has just hired a new lawyer who needs to get up to speed on the details of the case.
Is the Crown now proceeding with a charge of conspiracy to commit murder against Carbert and Olienick, when it has conceded that Lysak and Morin were not part of a conspiracy? Carbert and Olienick are scheduled to stand trial in June.
Ray McGinnis is a senior fellow with the Frontier Centre for Public Policy. His forthcoming book is Unjustified: The Emergencies Act and the Inquiry that Got It Wrong
Watch Ray McGinnis on Leaders on the Frontier here. September 27, 2023 (70 minutes)
Premier Danielle Smith issued the following statement on the April 2, 2025 U.S. tariff announcement:
“Today was an important win for Canada and Alberta, as it appears the United States has decided to uphold the majority of the free trade agreement (CUSMA) between our two nations. It also appears this will continue to be the case until after the Canadian federal election has concluded and the newly elected Canadian government is able to renegotiate CUSMA with the U.S. administration.
“This is precisely what I have been advocating for from the U.S. administration for months.
“It means that the majority of goods sold into the United States from Canada will have no tariffs applied to them, including zero per cent tariffs on energy, minerals, agricultural products, uranium, seafood, potash and host of other Canadian goods.
“There is still work to be done, of course. Unfortunately, tariffs previously announced by the United States on Canadian automobiles, steel and aluminum have not been removed. The efforts of premiers and the federal government should therefore shift towards removing or significantly reducing these remaining tariffs as we go forward and ensuring affected workers across Canada are generously supported until the situation is resolved.
“I again call on all involved in our national advocacy efforts to focus on diplomacy and persuasion while avoiding unnecessary escalation. Clearly, this strategy has been the most effective to this point.
“As it appears the worst of this tariff dispute is behind us (though there is still work to be done), it is my sincere hope that we, as Canadians, can abandon the disastrous policies that have made Canada vulnerable to and overly dependent on the United States, fast-track national resource corridors, get out of the way of provincial resource development and turn our country into an independent economic juggernaut and energy superpower.”
From the Fraser Institute
By any measure, Alberta is an energy powerhouse—within Canada, but also on a global scale. In 2023, it produced 85 per cent of Canada’s oil and three-fifths of the country’s natural gas. Most of Canada’s oil reserves are in Alberta, along with a majority of natural gas reserves. Alberta is the beating heart of the Canadian energy economy. And energy, in turn, accounts for one-quarter of Canada’s international exports.
Consider some key facts about the province’s energy landscape, as noted in the Alberta Energy Regulator’s (AER) 2023 annual report. Oil and natural gas production continued to rise (on a volume basis) in 2023, on the heels of steady increases over the preceding half decade. However, the dollar value of Alberta’s oil and gas production fell in 2023, as the surging prices recorded in 2022 following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine retreated. Capital spending in the province’s energy sector reached $30 billion in 2023, making it the leading driver of private-sector investment. And completion of the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion project has opened new offshore export avenues for Canada’s oil industry and should boost Alberta’s energy production and exports going forward.
In a world striving to address climate change, Alberta’s hydrocarbon-heavy energy sector faces challenges. At some point, the world may start to consume less oil and, later, less natural gas (in absolute terms). But such “peak” consumption hasn’t arrived yet, nor does it appear imminent. While the demand for certain refined petroleum products is trending down in some advanced economies, particularly in Europe, we should take a broader global perspective when assessing energy demand and supply trends.
Looking at the worldwide picture, Goldman Sachs’ 2024 global energy forecast predicts that “oil usage will increase through 2034” thanks to strong demand in emerging markets and growing production of petrochemicals that depend on oil as the principal feedstock. Global demand for natural gas (including LNG) will also continue to increase, particularly since natural gas is the least carbon-intensive fossil fuel and more of it is being traded in the form of liquefied natural gas (LNG).
Against this backdrop, there are reasons to be optimistic about the prospects for Alberta’s energy sector, particularly if the federal government dials back some of the economically destructive energy and climate policies adopted by the last government. According to the AER’s “base case” forecast, overall energy output will expand over the next 10 years. Oilsands output is projected to grow modestly; natural gas production will also rise, in part due to greater demand for Alberta’s upstream gas from LNG operators in British Columbia.
The AER’s forecast also points to a positive trajectory for capital spending across the province’s energy sector. The agency sees annual investment rising from almost $30 billion to $40 billion by 2033. Most of this takes place in the oil and gas industry, but “emerging” energy resources and projects aimed at climate mitigation are expected to represent a bigger slice of energy-related capital spending going forward.
Like many other oil and gas producing jurisdictions, Alberta must navigate the bumpy journey to a lower-carbon future. But the world is set to remain dependent on fossil fuels for decades to come. This suggests the energy sector will continue to underpin not only the Alberta economy but also Canada’s export portfolio for the foreseeable future.
Jock Finlayson
Senior Fellow, Fraser Institute
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