Keith David Lawson - Poriskyite Tax Evader

[Arthur Rubin]

July 20, 2016
...
After lunch immediate rambling that left me behind quickly. I was losing focus.

Something to do with a pint or two at lunch, perhaps? Still, the judge and the Crown couldn't follow his "arguments", so being sober might not have helped.

[Burnaby49]

July 20, 2016
...
After lunch immediate rambling that left me behind quickly. I was losing focus.

Something to do with a pint or two at lunch, perhaps? Still, the judge and the Crown couldn't follow his "arguments", so being sober might not have helped.

How dare you accuse me of boozing at lunch and neglecting my Quatloosian duties? Well, sometimes, maybe, on occasion, but not that lunchtime. I was just bludgeoned insensible by Lawson's relentless onslaught of gibberish. He simply overwhelmed my capacity to absorb nonsense.

[notorial dissent]

If I'd had to sit through that maundering monologue I would have been searching for some kind of internally applied anesthetic. So he basically spent a day going around in pretzel circles getting nowhere, of course it would help if he had actually had a point it would have helped. The only question I have is about the hobby/business stuff, isn't he missing the part where if the hobby makes money he still has to pay taxes on it if he makes more than he spends on the hobby.

[Burnaby49]

In my July 21st post I said;

Crown Cited Jordan, a Supreme Court of Canada case;

R. v. Jordan, 2016 SCC 27
http://canlii.ca/t/gsds3

But I was getting behind and missed the relevance. This is a very recent and very important case on undue delay but that wasn't the issue cited by the Crown.

This is the part that the Crown referred to;

[63] The second component of defence delay is delay caused solely by the conduct of the defence. This kind of defence delay comprises “those situations where the accused’s acts either directly caused the delay . . . or the acts of the accused are shown to be a deliberate and calculated tactic employed to delay the trial” (Askov, at pp. 1227-28). Deliberate and calculated defence tactics aimed at causing delay, which include frivolous applications and requests, are the most straightforward examples of defence delay. Trial judges should generally dismiss such applications and requests the moment it becomes apparent they are frivolous.

[Burnaby49]

The written decision on Lawson's abuse of process application is finally out.

http://www.mediafire.com/download/8hbz5 ... sion.pdf#!

To recap; my past few postings on this discussion relate to Lawson's attempt to get his charges stayed (stopped) even though he had already been convicted on all counts. His grounds for this request were abuse of process. The principal abuse seemed to have been that the Crown didn't agree with him about all of his Poriskyite beliefs and decided to prosecute him although he was clearly innocent of any intent to beak the laws. The abuse of process discussion starts here;

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=8223&start=60#p230588

These were the arguments that I noted that he'd made at the hearing;

His position in this application is that the Crown was guilty of abuse of process in the manner in which they gathered and presented the evidence at the inquiry. His specific complaint seemed to be in respect to the CRA investigator who was in control of his file and who gathered the evidence and testified at the inquiry. The examples of abuse of process that he cited were;

1 - The investigator wasn't trained properly.

2 - The investigator didn't know what income was and had no understanding of tax law.

3 - The investigator, and others in the investigation, did not take adequate notes of their internal processes, meetings, and decisions.

4 - If they did take notes they have hidden them from the Crown counsel and the court.

5 - He sent the investigator a letter saying he was innocent of tax evasion and explained why but they did not stop the investigation.

6 - They investigated on the basis of the presumption of his guilt but did not investigate him on the presumption that he was innocent,

7 - The Supreme Court of Canada had stated in a landmark decision that Canadian taxpayers have the option of categorizing their income as being derived from either a business or a hobby. If they declare their income to be derived from a hobby they cannot be reassessed or audited by the CRA. He told Investigations that his Paradigm work was a hobby and therefore not taxable but they ignored this and charged him anyhow. He was obsessed with this point because he had the Supreme Court case which clearly backed him up.

8 - Both he and his wife were charged with tax evasion. The Crown dropped his wife's charges but didn't drop his. I think this was a point he made, he mentioned his wife's issues in fragments rather than a coherent argument and I wasn't paying a lot of attentions.

Point 7 refers to the Stewart case, a Supreme Court of Canada decision that Lawson is obsessed with. He believes that Stewart clearly let him chose whether or not to declare his Paradigm income for tax purposes and that everyone else is just too dense to realize this. As I said;

Time for a bit of a digression while I bring up Stewart on Lawson's behalf because he mentioned it frequently during the trial to the point that he seemed to imply that it was the smoking gun that would exonerate him but the Crown and Court weren't allowing him to present it.

I'm guessing that Lawson wanted to use this as some kind of proof that, even if he made money from promoting Paradigm, he wasn't in business, it was a hobby and therefore not taxable. I'm assuming that he planned to rely on this sentence;

In order for an activity to be classified as commercial in nature, the taxpayer must have the subjective intention to profit and there must be evidence of businesslike behaviour which supports that intention.

To try and persuade the jury that he didn't have the subjective intention to profit, he was just helping his fellow truth-seekers and therefore he didn't have a business.

However Lawson has it backwards. The point of the Stewart decision wasn't that profits can be made non-taxable based on your claimed subjective intent but to allow business losses when you conducted yourself in a business-like manner. Mr. Stewart lost money on his apartment rentals which he applied against other income to reduce his taxable income from other sources. The CRA disallowed those losses on the basis he had no hope of making an operating profit from his apartments (as opposed to long-term capital gains) and the Supreme Court allowed him to have them on the basis that he ran a business-like operation, acted in a prudent business-like manner, and that it wasn't up to the CRA to decide whether or not he had a business.

However you can't flip this around when you are doing something that makes a profit, say by flogging Paradigm materials, and rely on Stewart to make the profits non-taxable by just claiming that you didn't intend to profit and you are actually just doing it as a hobby. The fact that you are acting in at least a basic business-like manner by selling a course of instructions and the accompanying materials at an amount in excess of your cost, contracting to perform duties for a client, invoicing for materials sold and services and making a profit from this is proof you have an actual business regardless of whatever you chose to call it.

Sadly the judge disagreed with him on this point;

[22] Firstly, with regard to the substantive issues, Mr. Lawson relies primarily on his interpretation of the case of Stewart. As he has asserted from the investigation stage, as set out in an affidavit dated October 24, 2011, his view is that that case supports his position that income from a hobby is income from a personal endeavor and therefore not required to be reported as income. He maintains that his income from Paradigm was income from a hobby.

[23] He also takes issue with Ms. Berman’s evidence on the Preliminary Inquiry as being a misstatement of his view of Stewart.

[24] I have considered the submission that a voir dire should be held to determine if this substantive deficiency, misinterpretation and erroneous application of the Stewart test, would found a remedy under s. 24(1) of the Charter. In my view, it would not.

[25] Mr. Lawson is committed to his view of the interpretation of Stewart and related jurisprudence. However, the proper procedure for those submissions is an appeal of the jury verdict. No remedy is available under s. 24(1) in this regard. It is not an abuse of process for investigators to disagree with a taxpayer on whether his income is taxable.

Then the judge considered the issue of his claims on how he was abused by the incompetent half-wits who prosecuted him;

[28] Mr. Lawson’s submissions can be summarized as alleging that the CRA, and in particular Ms. Berman, was negligent, not properly trained, and that her actions in the investigation and in laying the charges amount to misconduct. In particular, he relies upon the allegations that:
 there should have been more notes taken in the course of the investigation pursuant to provisions of various CRA policy manuals; and

if there were no notes because there were no meetings, that too is a breach of CRA policy.

While he does not allege a lack of disclosure by Crown counsel, he states that a cross-examination of CRA witnesses would establish that there were meetings at which notes were taken.

[33] There is no evidence of conduct such as was the basis of the application in the cases relied upon by Mr. Lawson. No notes were destroyed or lost. The Crown did not fail to disclose documents which, pursuant to Stinchcombe, should have been disclosed, or repudiate a plea agreement.

[34] There is no proffer of any evidence that would support a finding of abuse of process or that Mr. Lawson has been deprived of his life, liberty and security of the person not in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice. Even if, for example, it was established that there was a meeting where notes were taken, he has not demonstrated that his right to make full answer and defense has been affected, or that the conduct of any officers of the Crown have violated the fundamental principles that underlie the community’s sense of fair play and decency.

[35] In this case, the Notice fails to set out any reasonable basis upon which this Court could find the conduct of either the investigator or the prosecutors compromised trial fairness or undermined the judicial process.

[36] This hearing has not demonstrated that the application could, if evidence was heard, result in a stay of proceedings or any other Charter remedy.

[37] The application is therefore dismissed.

[38] As there are no further applications outstanding, the verdicts of the jury are entered.

Sentencing next then on to the inevitable appeal where he will no doubt try to relitigate the same losing arguments he's gone on and on about all along. Only he understands Stewart and everybody treated him unfairly.

[notorial dissent]

A bit of a digression, but wasn't Stewart about how a profit or loss would be figured with regard to income rather than whether it was taxable or not?

[Burnaby49]

A bit of a digression, but wasn't Stewart about how a profit or loss would be figured with regard to income rather than whether it was taxable or not?

Not sure what you mean by that. The issue was whether losses from a rental operation could be deducted against other income. Mr. Stewart had a couple of rental apartments and he was claiming losses in respect to them. He had no chance of making a profit because he'd borrowed almost all of the money to purchase them and the interest and other expenses exceeded the rental income and would for the foreseeable future. He applied the excess losses against income from other sources. Apparently his plan was to make a profit by eventually selling them at a gain. However, in the years under issue, he was losing money on them

At that time the CRA used a concept called REOP (Reasonable Expectation Of Profit). If, in the arbitrary judgment of an auditor, a claimed business had no expectation of profit, the CRA disallowed the losses. Mr. Stewart clearly had no expectation of profit so his losses were disallowed. The reassessment eventually made its way to the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) which threw REOP out the window and replaced it with a new basis of analysis. Essentially they said that it was not the role of the CRA to second-guess businessmen even if they lost money. So losses could only be denied if there was a personal component to the enterprise. Since there was no personal component to Stewart's rental operation, he didn't live in one of the units or apply personal expenses against the rental income, the SCC said that his losses were valid and deductible against other income.

Somehow, from this, Lawson dredged up his belief about hobbies not being taxable without having the slightest understanding of what the Stewart decision actually said. Effectively it said that if a venture had a personal component (say a hobby or personal expenses) then any expenses relating to the personal component could not be applied against other income, if there was no personal component losses were allowable. But the CRA could not just deny losses on the basis that the venture had no expectaion of profit. The case strictly focused on that, losses and how they were to be applied.

It's all here for anyone interested in reading the actual decision;

Stewart v. Canada, [2002] 2 SCR 645, 2002 SCC 46
http://canlii.ca/t/51sg

Lawson somehow spun that into a fantasy that the SCC was actually talking about income and had given its approval allowing anyone making money on a venture to designate whether that venture was a business or a hobby. In Lawson's fever-dream claiming your source of income was a hobby magically made it tax-free thanks to the SCC. I have no explanation of how Lawson came to that conclusion, there is nothing in the case even remotely to point on his conclusions. The only clue is that the judge said that he'd misinterpreted paragraphs 52 and 53. These are the paragraphs;

52 The purpose of this first stage of the test is simply to distinguish between commercial and personal activities, and, as discussed above, it has been pointed out that this may well have been the original intention of Dickson J.’s reference to “reasonable expectation of profit” in Moldowan. Viewed in this light, the criteria listed by Dickson J. are an attempt to provide an objective list of factors for determining whether the activity in question is of a commercial or personal nature. These factors are what Bowman J.T.C.C. has referred to as “indicia of commerciality” or “badges of trade”: Nichol, supra, at p. 1218. Thus, where the nature of a taxpayer’s venture contains elements which suggest that it could be considered a hobby or other personal pursuit, but the venture is undertaken in a sufficiently commercial manner, the venture will be considered a source of income for the purposes of the Act.

53 We emphasize that this “pursuit of profit” source test will only require analysis in situations where there is some personal or hobby element to the activity in question. With respect, in our view, courts have erred in the past in applying the REOP test to activities such as law practices and restaurants where there exists no such personal element: see, for example, Landry, supra; Sirois, supra; Engler v. The Queen, 94 D.T.C. 6280 (F.C.T.D.). Where the nature of an activity is clearly commercial, there is no need to analyze the taxpayer’s business decisions. Such endeavours necessarily involve the pursuit of profit. As such, a source of income by definition exists, and there is no need to take the inquiry any further.

But the judge said that paragraph 61 killed his argument;

61 As stated above, whether or not a taxpayer has a source of income from a particular activity is determined by considering whether the taxpayer intends to carry on the activity for profit, and whether there is evidence to support that intention. As well, where an activity is clearly commercial and lacks any personal element, there is no need to search further. Such activities are sources of income.

Where hobbies come into it nowadays are situations like the frequent attempts by taxpayers to write off travel and vacation costs on the basis that they are researching a book or looking for clients for a non-existent business.

[notorial dissent]

OK, maybe I stated that badly then. What I was trying to get at was that whether it was a business or a hobby didn't matter if it actually made a profit, that calling it one thing or the other didn't alter the profits being taxable, just whether the expenses and losses could be used against other income, which from the sounds of things Lawson's "hobby" made quite a nice little profit for him, with no or next to no expense in doing so. So he had income, taxable, whether he called it fish or fowl, liked it or not.

[Burnaby49]

OK, maybe I stated that badly then. What I was trying to get at was that whether it was a business or a hobby didn't matter if it actually made a profit, that calling it one thing or the other didn't alter the profits being taxable, just whether the expenses and losses could be used against other income, which from the sounds of things Lawson's "hobby" made quite a nice little profit for him, with no or next to no expense in doing so. So he had income, taxable, whether he called it fish or fowl, liked it or not.

Exactly. The only one who doesn't understand that is Lawson. No doubt I'll be hearing a lot about it in his appeal unless he gets a lawyer to handle things for him. No real lawyer would base an appeal on a mistake in law by the judge on the basis that she misunderstood Stewart.

[notorial dissent]

What I thought, it isn't about whether it is taxable or not but how you figure the tax, and he refuses to accept that, so he'll continue with his delusion until he is finally slapped down. Intentionally illiterate I would say.

[Burnaby49]

I've been scooped! Lawson had a hearing yesterday and I, of course, attended. But before I could write it up the local newspapers put out a report on it;

http://vancouversun.com/news/local-news ... come-taxes

A shoddy, shoddy piece of reporting. While the article mentioning that Michael Millar was there it didn't mention the hearing's most illustrious attendee. No, not me, but David Lindsay, the Unlicensed Man!

viewtopic.php?f=48&t=10022

Lindsay actually sat through the entire day but not a word from the so-called news about it. At least the article answers a question I had. There were six of us in the public seating and we all stayed the entire day. A huge number compared to my normal court days where it is usually just me. Today the onlookers were me, Millar, Lindsay, Lawson's father, a federal lawyer, and an unknown guy. So our reporter was Mr. Unknown Guy.

As to why it took so long to get this post up, I'm swamped with things to post! I have a 12,000 word draft in Word on the Peter Balogh Poriskyite tax evasion trial I attended that I have to go through one more time. I'm currently writing up the six days of Michael Millar's trial that I attended in the past two weeks and I have a 9,000 word draft of a two day joint voir dire hearing for Lawson/Anderson/Millar that I attended this spring but which I was (personally!) banned from reporting until the end of this week. So expect a deluge.

So, having said the above, I'll return to our normal programming by posting on my day in court.

September 21, 2016

Another day in court watching Keith Lawson in action one last time. The day was slated for sentencing arguments, both sides giving their arguments on the appropriate sentences for his offenses. I'll say this at the start. It passed my beer test. This is the hypothetical situation that I apply to court hearings. If I'd had a beer at lunch could I have stayed awake in the afternoon? Any of the six days of Michael Millar's hearings that I attended in the past two weeks (not yet posted) would have failed dismally but today was a winner. It had David Lindsay, the Unlicensed Man! Along with the aforesaid Michael Millar.

But let's put things in order. The hearing was supposed to start at 10:00 but was almost half an hour late because Lawson, after his disastrous attempts at representing himself throughout the trial, had finally retained a lawyer and he and the lawyer, who traveled over from Vancouver Island, had just met for the first time this morning. When we finally started the public seating included me, two other guys I'd not seem before plus an older guy (even older than the venerable Burnaby49!) I couldn't identify. He had been puzzling me for a while. He showed up sporadically at Poriskyite hearings, not just Lawson, sat down for a while taking notes, then left. Always dressed in a dark suit and didn't speak to anyone. As soon as the judge sat down David Lindsay and Michael Millar entered the courtroom. They did this throughout the day, at breaks and lunch. Wait for the judge to be seated and then come in. No doubt another piece of Freeman mythology about being under the standing of the court. The hearing was held in courtroom 62, a small room with only two rows of seats so Millar sat beside me and Lindsay sat in the row ahead. Millar must have memories of this courtroom. It was where he was arrested and handcuffed.

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=10834#p227241

But today the spotlight shone elsewhere. Crown started first. Lawson was teaching fraud and acting on it. But first asked that Charge 3 to be stayed even though Lawson was convicted of it. It was a duplicate of another charge. I don't have a copy of Charge 3 but it was specifically about evading tax in 2008 which is essentially a component of Charge 2;

Count 2

Keith David LAWSON, of the City of Burnaby, Province of British Columbia, between December 31, 2003 and May 1, 2009, did wilfully evade or attempt to evade payment of taxes imposed by the Income Tax Act in the amount of $46,176.20 for failing to report his taxable income in the amount of $213,213.13 for the 2004, 2005, 2006, 2008, and 2008 taxation years and did thereby commit an offence contrary to section 239(1)(d) of the said Act.

First an explanation of the options underdiscussion in this hearing. We all know what jail time is however the alternate sentence of conditional sentence might be unknown to some readers. Here is one description:

Conditional sentence ("house arrest")

A conditional sentence is an imprisonment (jail) sentence, except that the offender serves the sentence outside of jail, under strict, jail-like conditions.

Conditional sentences are sometimes called “house arrest,” because they often require an offender to spend all or part of the sentence in their house. Just like imprisonment, a conditional sentence will result in a conviction being registered against the offender.

To give an offender a conditional sentence, the judge first imposes a sentence of imprisonment and then considers whether to let the offender serve the sentence outside of jail.

There are restrictions on when a judge can impose a conditional sentence. A judge can only impose a conditional sentence if:

· the sentence of imprisonment is less than two years;
· the offender has not been convicted of a criminal offence that requires a minimum amount of jail time;
· the offender has not been convicted of a serious personal injury offence, a terrorism offence, or a criminal organization offence prosecuted by way of indictment for which the maximum term of imprisonment is ten years or more;
· the judge is satisfied that letting the offender serve the sentence in the community would not threaten the safety of the community;
· the judge is satisfied that having the offender serve the sentence in the community is consistent with the sentencing principles of the Criminal Code.

Conditional sentences have mandatory conditions, and they usually also have restrictions that make it like a jail sentence. House arrest is often part of a conditional sentence; at least for part of the sentence. House arrest usually means that the offender must stay in their home at all times (or during certain hours) unless they are working, attending school or religious worship, or for medical appointments or emergencies. Other conditions attached may be similar to those of a probation order. It is also common for a probation order to follow a conditional sentence.

http://lawfacts.ca/node/68

Obviously Lawson wanted a conditional sentence while the Crown wanted him to serve hard time. Crown said that while he could have a conditional sentence imposed on him this was "manifestly unfit" given the circumstances. Crown also wanted the sentence for counseling tax evasion to run consecutive to the tax evasion sentence rather than concurrent and wanted a fine of 100% of the taxes evaded. This fine is mandatory when there is a tax evasion conviction and 100% is the minimum fine the legislation allows. I assume that the Crown was recommending the minimum because Lawson seems unable to pay off any fine. Crown wanted six months for evasion and eighteen months for counseling for a total of two years.

Crown went into a detailed discussion of how they calculated the $313,066 in unreported income. This amount was higher than the amount entered at Lawson's trial because he apparently made admissions under cross-examination at trial that gave the Crown additional numbers.

The Crown said that Mr. Blokmanis, Lawson's lawyer, had raised a valid issue in respect to the calculation of taxable income. It has to do with the Canada Pension Plan. This is a mandatory deduction from income. I paid into it for 35 years and am now drawing a pension from it. Even though Lawson was self-employed he was required to pay into it and it is a deduction from taxable income. According to the Crown's calculations based on Blockmanis's comments, Lawson should have paid $58,312 during the 2004-2008 period. So the Crown is deducting this from the taxable income previously determined.

Crown went into aggrevating and mitigating circumstances. She said that the list was applicable to all of the offenses but that she focussed on the couneling charge.

Aggravating Circumstances

- The offenses were part of an OPCA scheme as lain out in Meads v Meads. This case was a game changer. These OPCA type schemes were not in the consciousness of the courts before the Meads decision but, as a result of Meads, courts could now place these schemes in perspective. Crown considered Lawson's tactics an aggravating circumstance.

- Paradigm targeted the trust relationship between government and taxpayers. It did so by saying, or implying, that the government was lying to taxpayers by saying they had to pay tax when in fact, paying taxes was optional.

- Lawson's actions were part of a large organization set up to evade taxes. He is recalcitrant in his views. He challenged the authority of the government, the CRA, the court, the Crown, and the law. He had 32 students who he taught this.

Mitigating Circumstances

- The absence of a criminal history at least a neutral factor. Neutral at best. Discussed health concerns and family circumstances. Crown said that these wee not significant enough to warrant a conditional sentence and that defense would go into them in more details. Lawson's financial insecurity, while regrettable, was the result of his own actions. He could have been a productive member of society but chose otherwise.

- His personal culpability must be considered very high based on his knowledge of the caselaw. Evasion and counseling are distinct and separate offenses that should result in consecutive sentences. Crown noted that Porisky was given consecutive sentences in both of his convictions and it was equally appropriate for Lawson.

- Crown noted that Paradigm materials were presented as an option to paying taxes. They called this "the forgotten option" (as if the country at large, in a fit of absent-mindedness, forgot that they could choose not to pay tax). Paradigm was set up to convince students that they had been lied to by the federal government. Paradigm was a big operation with 30 educators and over 800 students. Crown discussed the first Porisky trial. There are 31 known Paradigm-based sentencing decisions apart from Porisky and Gould. Crown calculated that $4,500,000 in taxes were evaded in these cases. Four of Lawson's students were in the list of convicted. One, a Daniel Kobelt, was sentenced to two and a half years (unreported). Then morning break.

Back to it. Lawson's participation in Paradigm was a deliberate choice and his participation was essential to Paradigm's scheme. The evidence has established knowledge on Lawson's part that the Paradigm scheme was illegal. He was aware of cases Paradigm followers lost. This included Sydel.

Note - This is the Sydel decision referred to by the Crown;

R. v. Sydel, 2006 BCPC 346
http://canlii.ca/t/1p2m1

Eva Sydel was a Poriskyite dentist who was convicted of income tax evasion. The court concluded in her decision;

[21] In conclusion, I find that Dr. Sydel was wilfully blind. The finding of wilful blindness precludes a successful argument that the Crown failed to prove the required Mens Rea. It also defeats the argument that she did not wilfully commit the nine offences charged in the Information.

[22] When she made the false and deceptive statements in her T1 Forms (the subject of counts 1 to 4), they were made due to her choice to be wilfully blind. Her addition of the words, “to be best of my knowledge” and “without understanding” actually adds to the evidence of her being wilfully blind. She need not have remained “without understanding”. She need not have left herself in the position of having to qualify her state of knowledge about the tax issues, as being “to the best of my knowledge”. She could have and she should have, chosen to clear up any concerns or misunderstandings that she had, by seeking independent professional tax accounting and / or legal advice. For Dr. Sydel to say that it was up to CCRA to provide her with detailed written arguments as to how they justified taxing people, is a totally unreasonable position for her to have taken. Had she not been operating from a position of wilful blindness, she would have sought her own independent advise or utilized the methods of dispute and appeals available within the tax department and thereafter in the Tax Courts. The Income Tax Act outlines the legal procedures to be taken by people who disagree with the CCRA Assessments. Dr. Sydel, it appears, never even looked at the Income Tax Act to see if there were appeal procedures and she never inquired of anyone (professional or not), as to whether such procedures existed as part of a person’s rights under Canadian law. She chose instead to be wilfully blind and must be found guilty on Counts 1, 2, 3 and 4 of the Information.

[23] When Dr. Sydel failed to report her gross business income of close to three quarters of a million dollars throughout the periods set out in Counts 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 of the Information, she did so wilfully by virtue of her wilful blindness. Accordingly is guilty of tax evasion as charged in Counts 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 of the Information.

This decision came out in May of 2006 yet Lawson kept teaching the Paradigm tax evasion scheme, and selling Paradigm information, until his home was searched in 2009. This is the basis of the Crown's position about knowledge, that Sydel for one, and other cases, had proven that the Poriskyite system was illegal but Lawson continued on anyhow because promoting Paradigm was his livelihood. I'll skip ahead at this point to give his response to this. He claimed that one or two cases did not constitute a "critical mass" proving Porisky wrong and, in any case, the Sydel decision wasn't law because Eva Sydel could have appealed it. He said that it would only have been law had she done so but she didn't leaving the issue unresolved.

That of course didn't cover the embarrassing point of the Kennedy case, heard in 2000, which the Crown also cited. This is the Kennedy decision;

Kennedy v. Canada (Customs & Revenue Agency), 2000 CanLII 22837 (ON SC)
http://canlii.ca/t/1wd1t

Note that Kennedy was represented by David Lindsay, one of today's spectators. This is the key issue in that case;

[1] The applicant Thomas Kennedy was employed as a teacher by the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board (the “Board”). He retired at the end of the 1999-2000 school year. On October 5, 1998, he sent a “Constructive Notice” to the Minister of the National Revenue terminating “any supposed or assumed contract” obliging him to file an income tax return and pay income tax. He did so as “a natural person of commoner status”, stating that, as such, he was “not a ‘person’ included in the Income Tax Act of Canada who is subject to the income tax” (Applicant’s Book of Authorities, Tab 1).

[9] Under s. 2 of the Income Tax Act, the liability to pay income tax is imposed on resident or non-resident “persons”. Under s. 248(1) of the Act, a “person” is defined as follows:
“person”, or any word or expression descriptive of a person, includes any corporation, and any entity exempt, because of subsection 149(1), from tax under Part I on all or part of the entity’s taxable income and the heirs, executors, administrators or other legal representatives of such a person, according to the law of that part of Canada to which the context extends;
In his submissions, Mr. Lindsay emphasized the words “includes any corporation”. By inference, he says, Parliament intended to exclude natural persons from this statutory definition of a “person”. At least, that is what I understand to be the essence of his submission.

This was the court's conclusion;

[20] I am also driven to the conclusion that there is nothing in the context of the Income Tax Act. or in the authorities to which Mr. Lindsay has referred me, that would support the interpretation that in the Income Tax Act, Parliament intended the word “person” to be used in the narrower sense of comprising only corporations or other artificial persons. The statutory definition of a “person” in section 248(1) of the Income Tax Act includes “the heirs, executors, administrators… of such a person”. Only a natural person who has died has “heirs, executors, administrators…”. A corporation or other artificial person does not. As the English jurist Lord Chancellor Thurlow (1731-1806) is quoted as saying: “Did you ever expect a corporation to have a conscience, when it has no soul to be damned, and no body to be kicked?” J. Poynder, Literary Extracts, (1844) Vol. 1, page 268.

[21] I find that a “person” as defined in s. 248(1) of the Income Tax Act includes both a natural person and an artificial person. It follows that the applicant is a “person” and a “taxpayer”. I also find that he is a person “resident” in Canada. Either a corporation or a person may be “resident” or, indeed, for other legal purposes “domiciled”, in Canada or elsewhere. As a “person”, the applicant has the same rights and obligations as any other “person” under the Income Tax Act. His obligations include the filing of annual income tax returns and the payment of any income tax owing under his returns.

[22] The more fundamental submission by the applicant, that payment of income tax is a voluntary act of the taxpayer in the nature of a contract, was not fully developed before me by Mr. Lindsay in a legal sense. Rather, the proposition seems to be taken as self-evident. The apparent failure of the Agency to deny the proposition is inconclusive. Rule 25.07(2) of the Ontario Rules of Civil Procedure, to which Mr. Lindsay referred me, applies only to pleadings in an action; not to application records or factums. The Latin maxims upon which the applicant relies on this branch of his case are devoid of any context that would make them applicable to this application.

[23] The Income Tax Act is valid legislation enacted by the Parliament of Canada and applicable in accordance with its terms. It is a public Act of Parliament and not a private Act as suggested by the applicant. I have already expressed my view that the applicant is one of the “persons” to whom the Act applies (para. [22] above). In my view, there is no support in “the common law, aka the rule of law” for the extremely broad proposition that all taxes are voluntary. The rule of law refers to the supremacy of law over the exercise of arbitrary power, J.A. Corry & J.E. Hodgetts, Democratic Government & Politics, (1959) 3rd Ed., page 96. The Income Tax Act is a law of general application enacted by an elected legislature. It does not represent an exercise of arbitrary power.

I think Lawson said at one time that it was only with the Stanchfield decision that he realized that Paradigm may not have been correct. Stanchfield came out in January 2009;

Canada (National Revenue) v. Stanchfield, 2009 FC 72 (CanLII)
http://canlii.ca/t/22bqk

And thoroughly refuted Paradigm's theories.

[25] None of this information was contradicted by Mr. Stanchfield, who testified first in his capacity as a “natural person, for his own benefit” and as a witness for the respondent, and then as the respondent himself. In his capacity as a “natural person”, he confirmed that he has done the various acts, signed the various documents, incorporated the various companies, held the various accounts, etc. as stated by Ms. Tove Mills. His only disagreement with the applicant stems from the differentiation he attempts to make between his various capacities.

[26] For the reasons already stated previously, this is a distinction that finds no basis in the Act nor in Mr. Justice Gibson’s Order. The distinction drawn by Mr. Stanchfield between his capacity as a natural person and his capacity to act in some other way is entirely of his own doing, and is devoid of any support in the case law. He has conceded that his various identities occupy the same physical body, have the same birth date and sign the same way. In fact, he would be unilaterally choosing in what capacity he acts; this is obviously an untenable proposition, and one that runs afoul of any tenable interpretation of the Act.

[27] Section 123 of that Act provides that an “individual” means a natural person, and that a “person” means an individual, a partnership, a corporation, the estate of a deceased individual, a trust, or a body that is a society, union, club, association, commission or other organization of any kind. Nowhere in these definitions do we find a distinction between a natural person and the legal representative of the taxpayer. Moreover, it is beyond dispute that Mr. Stanchfield, in whichever capacity he may choose to act, was clearly contemplated as coming within the Order of Mr. Justice Gibson.

[28] On the basis of the evidence submitted to the Court, I am therefore of the view that the applicant has established the required prerequisites for a finding of contempt. It does not matter whether Mr. Stanchfield had the intent to contravene the Order of Mr. Justice Gibson, as mens rea is not a required element; it is only relevant as a mitigating factor relative to the penalties to be imposed.

So it is Lawson's position, notwithstanding Kennedy's loss in 2000 and Sydel's criminal conviction and jail sentence in 2006 that there was nothing conclusive to persuade him that the Paradigm theory was wrong. These were just a few individual isolated cases that did not represent a "critical mass".

Back to Crown's submissions. While Lawson had every right to challenge the charges he has done so through Paradigm theory. Mr. Lawson continues to challenge the court, Crown, and government in the face of evidence that his arguments are illegal.

Some general comments about overall effect of the Paradigm evasion on the fiscal and trust in government. A quote from some case how tax evasion erodes the moral and economic basis of society.

Crown went into detail on the sentences imposed in past decision relating to Paradigm educators. Almost all got jail and the ones that didn't, Denise Eddy;

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=9899

And Richard Cory Stanchfield;

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=10464

received conditional sentences based on joint submissions between Crown and accused where the accused pled guilty rather than go to trial. All remaining educators got jail time. Even Kobert and Williams, who both pled guilty received jail sentences. No educators escaped jail time unless they pled guilty and admitted their guilt. Crown went through individual cases comparing them to Lawson. Even the student convictions attracted a significant amount of jail time. Crown read from Sydel decision how a conditional sentence wasn't appropriate. Crown noted that Sydel was just a student but ended up serving a jail sentence. Notwithstanding Lawson's health and family issues jail time was the only appropriate sentence. Except for his health and family issues the Crown would have asked for a longer sentence. Crown also requested that the court order that a DNA sample be taken. The Crown had no submission regarding the victim surcharge. This ended Crown's submissions.

Defense lawyer started his submissions. This was when I found that the unidentified older guy was Lawson's father. Lawyer gave a bit of background. Lawson was 46 years old with a grade 12 education (high school). After high school he spent ten years in the automotive section. I assume as a car salesman since we have no automotive manufacturing here. He then took a year off to "explore himself". He started reviewing legal cases as a hobby. He married in 1999. He has two children, sons aged five and eleven. He is currently unemployed and has been since 2009. He first interacted with Russell Porisky and other tax protesters in 1999 but didn't meet Porisky until 2001. He found Porisky to be a charismatic individual and that he could not refute Porisky's arguments. They became friends. Lawson "scaled down" his Paradigm activities in 2009 when there was finally a critical mass of decisions against it. He has no job or assets, no car and doesn't own his residence. He has not breached his surety release.

He noted something about Lawson being arrested under a bench warrant because he didn't show up for a hearing but brushed it off as being related to "health issues". On to health issues. We got very clinical and it appears that Lawson has some actual significant chronic problems. He was knocked of his motorbike in September 1987 (I make him 18 at that time). Kidney damage, spleen removed. A catheter caused problems which resulted in a urinary infection. Scarred urethra. Skipped to 2013 when there were a bunch of things. Numerous emergency admissions. List showed (as far as I can tell from trying to keep up with the lawyer, he talked very fast) up to two admissions a month. Frequent urinary infections which could lead to sepsis. I had to look that up;

http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-cond ... c-20169784

Lawyer had an August 2016 letter from a urologist at the University of British Columbia saying that Lawson's reconstructive surgery had only been partly successful. Another doctor gave a letter on his general medical history. Judge cut in to say that she didn't have a copy of the lawyer's sentencing submission. He was retained so short a time ago and has been in such a rush that he has no copy available right now. Both Crown and defense offered to give the court their copy but both had been marked so that didn't work. So judge said that she had one question, the same one I was thinking. We'd gone through a number of Lawson's medical emergencies during the trial but they didn't seem relate to what the lawyer was now telling us. She said that Lawson had turned to his health issues many times at trial but she was never advised of the medical issues being detailed now. Defense said that Lawson has a high risk of urinary and blood infections in jail. Even if the jail staff tries they can't provide the level of care necessary. There is a high risk of significant consequences in jail. Then time for lunch break and concerns that this isn't going to be finished in the day allotted to it.

As soon as we restarted the judge said she had a question for defense about the Crown's revised income submissions. Did defense have any objections to them? Yes! Various issues including the fact that the jury did not have the opportunity to review these new numbers. He has different numbers regarding the taxes evaded but they are insignificant. Lawson popped up about something (he was sitting in the dock) but judge told him to sit down, his lawyer could answer for him. Lawyer thought that the Crown's earned income in the 2004-2008 period was wrong. Judge asked "What is your submission?" I don't have one. His position was that the numbers were wrong, he doesn't trust them, but he has no way to argue them. He was saying that the Crown is wrong but that he had no way to prove this because he had no facts to show a different position. Not surprising since he's just been retained and probably hasn't had time for anything but a cursory review of the evidence.

Judge - You said that Lawson has shown remorse (he'd said that somewhere earlier, news to me). How has he expressed that remorse? He will be addressing the court himself later and he has reference letters. Judge - They are hearsay about his remorse. Lawyer - he will say that he has had a change of heart and is remorseful. He has ceased disseminating Paradigm information.

On with the defense submission. Lawyer had no issues with the described nature and subject of Paradigm. However Lawson's taxable income from Paradigm, if averaged out, was only about $62,000 a year for the years under review. I couldn't see a point to that comment. Crown said in aggravating circumstances that Lawson's actins were planned and deliberate however he did not intend to flout the law. Judge - Isn't that antithetical to the jury decision? Lawyer said that Lawson made a mistake in law. This is the legal argument that the defendant tried to follow the law but misunderstood it. Judge jumped on that one. There was no mistake in law. The jury found that his intention is proven as a fact. Intention is implicit in the verdict. Mens rea has been proven. Judge said that Lawson tried the mistake in law defense at the trial and it was not permitted. Didn't you read this in the jury charge? Lawyer hadn't seen the charges.

He didn't like Lawson being called a broad-brushed OPCA litigant. Crown has submitted that breach of trust arises in this case. This is the same in all tax evasion cases so this is not an aggravating circumstance. (note - not true. The Crown's specific point was that the breach of trust related to Paradigm saying that the government was lying to us by insisting that we had to pay tax when it is actually optional. These purported government lies eroded trust in government. However most tax evaders recognize they are legally required to pay tax and that the tax laws are legitimate. They just don't want to pay them).

Regarding Crown's comments that he continued teaching Paradigm beliefs after students had been pursued by the CRA. I ask the court to be very careful about the timeline to know when he knew of case results. Lawyer had no submissions on this but their are questions whether Crown has met its burden. He mentioned the Sydel case which I linked earlier. It was decided in May 2006 with a criminal conviction and a jail sentence for Eva Sydel. Lawyer said that the decision wasn't appealed so the case wasn't finished. This meant that Paradigm could come to its own conclusions on whether the decision was right or wrong. A novel interpretation! Under this standard any legal decision that is not appealed is worthless as precedence or as an indication of the right or wrongs of the issues litigated.

The Crown noted Lawson's continued distrust and defiance of authority. Nothing illegal about that! It's necessary in a free society. (Tax evasion is necessary to protect my freedoms as a Canadian?). The lawyer started running away from me. He talked very quickly and I couldn't keep up any more.

It may be tempting to consider his actions as an educator as an aggravating circumstance. However this was an element of the charge, Since he was convicted of it this can't be aggravating.

Then on to health. Custody would be hard on him with his health issues. Defense opposes the DNA sample. It is discretionary. He didn't think Lawson should pay the victims of crime surcharge. He is in modest circumstances and didn't profit by his actions (note - Only because he was caught. What about that $300,000 or so he made as an educator?). He now has no income or assets. He is married with two sons. Lawyer recommended an appropriate sentence as a conditional sentence of two years less a day for charge 1, the counseling charge;

Count 1
Keith David LAWSON, at or near the City of Burnaby in the Province of British Columbia and elsewhere, between April 15, 2002 and August 26, 2010, did counsel various persons to commit the indictable offence of fraud in excess of five thousand dollars, contrary to section 380 of the Criminal Code and did thereby commit an offence contrary to section 464(a) of the Criminal Code.

He requested 100% fine on taxes evaded, the minimum fine. He said conditional sentence appropriate of evasion charges. He cited principle of restraint which suggests alternatives to incarceration. Lawson is a first-time offender and a non-violent crime. Lawyer implied that there were not enough Paradigm decisions to indicate a pattern that only educators who pled guilty received conditional sentences.

Lawson is showing remorse, he has no criminal record, he's stopped dissemination of material (That comment seems entirely pointless. Paradigm is dead and Lawson is a convicted criminal as a result of his participating in it, All of his Paradigm material was confiscated by the Crown and Porisky, the man who supplied it to him, is in jail. How is stopping in those circumstances mitigating?). While he didn't stop when cases were lost he stopped when it was clear to Lawson that cases had taken a critical mass. Judge - When was this? I have no definite date. Say end of 2009. Even though the Sydel decision was out two years earlier (Note - Over three years earlier. Sydel was released July 11, 2006) he acted appropriately when he realized the courts did not agree with him (note again - He stopped when the CRA searched his home under warrant and seized all of his Paradigm material). Lawyer - It is up to the court. Court is entitled to accept or reject submissions. Mr. Lawson is a man of good character. I was moved by his references by family and friends.

At this point he was getting very repetitive and my hand was worn out. Lawyer said that Lawson really sincerely believed paradigm teachings. He has bad health and is the primary caregiver for his children.

We took the afternoon break and resumed at 3:35. Time was running out and the judge said that she couldn't stay past 4:00. Lawson still had to speak and Crown has a rebuttal. Crown said that they could put the rebuttal in writing. Defense said that he'd just be a few more minutes then Lawson could speak before day ended. So lawyer had a few more words then Lawson's turn.

My intention in joining Paradigm was not to avoid paying tax. I respected Porisky. I disagreed with the law but eventually decided that I was wrong. In 2004 I knew it was the right thing to file my return. I tried to do the right thing.

Note - I'm not clear on the 2004 issue. Apparently he filed something or other but did not declare his Paradigm income. As the charge said;

Count 2
Keith David LAWSON, of the City of Burnaby, Province of British Columbia, between December 31, 2003 and May 1, 2009, did wilfully evade or attempt to evade payment of taxes imposed by the Income Tax Act in the amount of $46,176.20 for failing to report his taxable income in the amount of $213,213.13 for the 2004, 2005, 2006, 2008, and 2008 taxation years and dif thereby commit an offence contrary to section 239(1)(d) of the said Act.

And if he decided in 2004 that it was the "right thing" to file his return why didn't he file in 2005, 2006, 2007, or 2008?

Anyhow, onward. I did a lot of effort to find what was reasonable. I didn't work with students who just wanted to evade tax. Sydel was not a watershed case. There were grounds for appeal but she did not appeal it so it had an inconclusive outcome. (That comment would be a surprise to Eva Sydel who spent a few years in jail as a result of the "inconclusive outcome"). He said that the Stanchfield case changed his mind. By then some of his students had been convicted of tax evasion. He tried to help them. He said that he voluntarily filed in 2008. He tried to meet "the accounting association and authorities" to get clear answers to his questions but didn't get them.

I apologize if I deprived the government of taxes I legitimately owed. I accept my mistake. "My family thing." He started crying and breaking down so I couldn't understand him. Something about liver failure in May 2013. Trauma. Crying again. No protection from germs attacking me. He was concerned about going to jail over this. I didn't feel that my health was relevant for trial proceedings this year. The bench warrant was issued because he could not attend a court hearing because he was in emergency and he couldn't contact the court. If I had no children but it was just me I wouldn't be so concerned about this. A jail sentence poses a large risk to my life; kidney failure, blocked passage. The jail doesn't have the facilities to do the procedure. I spoke to lawyers who supported my beliefs. The standard was one of reasonableness and three lawyers and two accountants couldn't say that I was wrong so I thought that if I was audited I had a reasonable position I'm sorry I made that mistake and won't do it again.

Note - The comment "I thought that if I was audited I had a reasonable position" falls right into what the Crown has always argued was one of the prime reasons for the elaborate Paradigm setup. Crown has claimed in court that the main reason Paradigm existed was to give tax evaders an excuse if caught. They could point to the library of Paradigm written material, the masses of Porisky's videos, the obscure and arcane explanations and analysis about "natural person" and justify their actions on the basis that they were doing their best to follow tax laws and that the Paradigm system seemed correct and reasonable so they had no mens rea about criminally evading tax.

Lawson said that he though that covered everything that he had to say. Judge thanked him then asked Crown counsel if she wanted to make her rebuttal submission in writing. Yes. Judge - What is your time frame? Then unfortunate news, at least from my perspective. Crown counsel said "I regret to inform you that this is my last appearance as Federal Crown. Next month I transfer to the Provincial Crown." I don't normally give the names of the government staff working on the cases I report but the news article has publicly noted that Jessica Patterson is Crown counsel in Lawson. She and her co-counsel (they swap Crown Counsel role back and forth between cases) have soldiered dutifully through the Poriskyite counselor/evader cases for years. I've watched them handle Stanchfield, Porisky, Gould, Millar and Lawson and they've done an excellent, really outstanding job with difficult files. While the Millar decision is still outstanding they have had a 100% success rate to date. Now the dynamic duo was breaking up just as their Poriskyite labours were ending. So my thanks to Ms. Patterson for her stalwart efforts on behalf of we cringing, submissive taxpayers too terrified of the authority and power of the Crown to challenge the Income Tax Act with bullshit tax evasion theories.

Judge set a short hearing at the end of the month to set a date for the sentencing hearing. Probably some time in October. The judge thanked Ms. Patterson for her efforts "Ms. Patterson, let me take the opportunity to thank you on behalf of the court" then she confirmed with the registrar that there was no publication ban on reporting the hearing. I thought, egotistically, that she'd checked about a possible ban on my behalf until I saw the newspaper report about the hearing this morning. I'm crushed.

[Burnaby49]

Now my comment on the overall argument that Lawson, Millar, and Porisky made at various points in their long drawn-out legal proceedings. They were not trying to evade paying tax or teach tax evasion. That was only a minor part of what they were doing. They were exploring, researching, and teaching Canadian human rights. Porisky said that he considered himself to be a human rights educator and that the goal of Paradigm was to teach human rights. But somehow, unfortunately, the only burningly urgent human rights issue that Porisky, Lawson and Millar could uncover after massive research was the right to not pay taxes. So they quite naturally went with what they had and ended up profiting handsomely from instructing their fellow Canadians on how to evade income tax. As judge Meyers said in the Sydel decision;

e. Dr. Sydel testified that she first became aware of the concepts of “natural persons”, “artificial persons”, “corporate soles” and “taxpayers”, when she read an article in a naturalist magazine called “Shared Visions”. By coincidence, the author came into her office as a patient a short while later. She spoke with him about his concepts and theories and then began attending a variety of seminars on the topic of not having to pay income tax. She attended approximately five to seven full day seminars, at a cost of $20.00 per seminar. She testified that she was intrigued by the author and the seminar leaders’ philosophy as to why governments did not have the right to interfere with a person’s privacy, human rights or their basic freedoms. Two matters struck me: (1) the only human “right” that either Dr. Sydel or her lecturers were concerned about, was the right not to pay income taxes. Neither Dr. Sydel nor any of the lecturers seemed at all concerned with the other types of rights listed as inalienable rights in our Chart of Rights legislation – the right to freedom of religion, expression, press, peaceful assembly, association, just to name a few; and (2) Dr. Sydel’s sudden interest in tax matters arises, by coincidence, just one year after her Petition for Bankruptcy, which involved writing off a considerable past indebtedness to Revenue Canada ($25,000).

R. v. Sydel, 2006 BCPC 346
http://canlii.ca/t/1p2m1

In his statement at the end of his sentencing hearing Lawson spoke passionately about how he was trying to remain in honour and to act only in an honourable fashion. He said, without examples, that he turned down students who seemed only interested in using Paradigm's teachings to avoid paying taxes. Really? What else did Paradigm and Lawson teach? If tax avoidance/evasion was not the primary, in fact only purpose of Paradigm, why were students charged on the basis of a percentage of the taxes they evaded by applying Porisky's bullshit? Porisky and the educators were paid a fee of 7% of the taxes that his students evaded. Didn't Lawson think that a somewhat unseemly method of recompense if he was just teaching human rights?

So let's talk about the first definitive event where it was clearly proven that the entire Paradigm scheme was actually just a cover for outright tax evasion, the conviction of Eva Sydel. As judge Meyer wrote;

[21] In conclusion, I find that Dr. Sydel was wilfully blind. The finding of wilful blindness precludes a successful argument that the Crown failed to prove the required Mens Rea. It also defeats the argument that she did not wilfully commit the nine offences charged in the Information.

[22] When she made the false and deceptive statements in her T1 Forms (the subject of counts 1 to 4), they were made due to her choice to be wilfully blind. Her addition of the words, “to be best of my knowledge” and “without understanding” actually adds to the evidence of her being wilfully blind. She need not have remained “without understanding”. She need not have left herself in the position of having to qualify her state of knowledge about the tax issues, as being “to the best of my knowledge”. She could have and she should have, chosen to clear up any concerns or misunderstandings that she had, by seeking independent professional tax accounting and / or legal advice. For Dr. Sydel to say that it was up to CCRA to provide her with detailed written arguments as to how they justified taxing people, is a totally unreasonable position for her to have taken. Had she not been operating from a position of wilful blindness, she would have sought her own independent advise or utilized the methods of dispute and appeals available within the tax department and thereafter in the Tax Courts. The Income Tax Act outlines the legal procedures to be taken by people who disagree with the CCRA Assessments. Dr. Sydel, it appears, never even looked at the Income Tax Act to see if there were appeal procedures and she never inquired of anyone (professional or not), as to whether such procedures existed as part of a person’s rights under Canadian law. She chose instead to be wilfully blind and must be found guilty on Counts 1, 2, 3 and 4 of the Information.

[23] When Dr. Sydel failed to report her gross business income of close to three quarters of a million dollars throughout the periods set out in Counts 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 of the Information, she did so wilfully by virtue of her wilful blindness. Accordingly is guilty of tax evasion as charged in Counts 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 of the Information.

Seems pretty conclusive to me. Yet Lawson ignored this decision and flogged Paradigm's tax evasion scheme for another three years. He said at the sentencing hearing that Sydel's conviction really was not conclusive, that reasonable people could disagree on its importance or legal relevance. He said that he'd believed this for two reasons. Firstly he said that he had been told by a number of unidentified accountants and lawyers that it really wasn't a final legally binding decision. They apparently all told him that court decisions only have legal weight after they are appealed and the original decision is confirmed by the appeals court. So, Eva Sydel's criminal conviction was just another step in the process, just one more hearing on the way to a final decision. Since she did not appeal her decision the process was never completed and her decision was legally irrelevant. I'd say that it was certainly relevant to Eva. She was sentenced to eighteen months of jail time and served out her sentence while Lawson continued to sell the Paradigm dream.

His second point regarding why he'd disregarded Sydel was that he didn't think a single decision on a Paradigm student was enough to prove that Paradigm's teachings were wrong. That required a "critical mass" of decisions. I have to admit that this concept is a new one to me. I've not yet read a case where a judge rejected a prior decision as precedence because it was not considered sufficient, in itself, since it was not part of a "critical mass".

Lawson neglected to inform us what number of adverse decisions constituted this critical mass, just that Sydel, alone, didn't do it. While pleading that he was an honourable man trying to act reasonably in the aftermath of Sydel he made no mention that selling Paradigm literature, and being a Paradigm educator, were his only sources of income making it very expensive for him to conclude that Paradigm was wrong after just one adverse decision, no matter how damning. If I recall correctly he only stopped his Paradigm activities after the CRA knocked on his front door with a search warrant and seized all of his Paradigm related materials. I guess that event finally constituted his "critical mass".

[Burnaby49]

Now it can be told!

I like a punchy opening. However, like tabloid headlines, the contents are much more mundane. This posting covers a two day Supreme Court of British Columbia hearing held on March 22nd and 23rd, 2016 relating to a voir dire on an application by the Crown. It was a joint hearing for three accused Poriskyites;

Debbie Anderson;
viewtopic.php?f=50&t=10747

Michael Spencer Millar;
viewtopic.php?f=50&t=10834

Keith Lawson;
viewtopic.php?f=50&t=8223

The Crown wanted a ruling that the records seized from Russell Porisky's house which related to the three defendants could be submitted in evidence at their trials as business records and have the documents excluded from the best evidence rules. As I understand it this would eliminate the necessity of proving them all. The three accused opposed allowing the evidence as business records. At least this was the purported reason for the defendant's objection. The session quickly turned into yet another venue for Millar and Lawson's demented obsessions with capitalization, private documents, private persons acting in their private capacity, and jurisprudence. One of the most manic sessions I've yet attended.

So why have I waited over six months to report it? As explained later in this posting I was the subject of a personal publication ban on the proceedings! What this meant was that I could not publish anything about the hearing until all three trials, if they were jury trials, were concluded. The theory is that jurors or potential jurors might read my postings and might, as a result, might become biased against the defendants. This continues right through trial because I often hear information not available to the jurors because they have been excluded while the parties and judge discuss issues. The ban did not include trials by judge alone because judges are supposedly immune to being influenced by my babbling.

The problem with this was Debbie Anderson. Lawson's jury trial is done and Millar re-elected to be tried by a judge. But Debbie's trial has yet to be held and, until very recently, she was full-speed ahead on having a jury trial. Apparently she's been giving that some second thought after juries found Porisky, Gould, and Lawson guilty on all counts in almost indecent haste. So last Friday she re-elected for a trial by judge effectively ending the publication ban. I've had this posting written up for months in anticipation of this so here it is.


Tuesday March 22, 2016

Another day in court another personalized publication ban. I was back in my old Nanaimo Three and Charles Norman Holmes territory at the New Westminster courthouse. It had been almost two years since I was here last, attending the Alexander Ream trial and handicapped by five broken ribs.

A busy courtroom at the start. Three defendants, one lawyer representing Anderson (I won't bother to introduce him he won't be in the cast of characters very long), two court clerks, two Crown counsel (same pair that handled the Porisky/Gould trial), a sheriff and the judge. Nobody in the public seating except me and another Crown lawyer watching the proceedings. That would change in a few minutes when Debbie Anderson changed status from a party to the proceedings to a spectator and spent the rest of the day sitting just down the row from me.

Lawson and Millar introduced themselves to the judge as being there in their private capacity as private persons making Special Appearances. Debbie didn't introduce herself. Lawson immediately noted that he was trying to get everything stopped because the court did not have jurisdiction over him. We got a lot of that later. Millar popped up and stated he was also challenging the court's jurisdiction. We got LOTS of that later from him.

A word about the judge before we begin. Not the same judge as the March 16th hearing. A blunt no-nonsense guy who had no compunction against stomping on Millar and Lawson when required. It was required a lot today.

Debbie's lawyer spoke immediately after the introductions saying that Debbie was not contesting the Crown's application to allow the documents to be entered into evidence in her trial. He said that his retainer had "extinguished" immediately after he made that concession on Debbie's behalf and he no longer represented her. So he asked the court to release him from representing her and when judge approved he was gone. Debbie, no longer a party, came and sat down in the public seating and remained there for the rest of the day. A long day.

Lawson said that he had issues to discuss. He's unclear on something. He'd filed his arguments on jurisdictional issues last Friday. Judge immediately squashed him on that one. He said that the court very clearly had jurisdiction over Lawson. He cited R. v Anderson, Debbie's own case, where he'd said;

E. Jurisdiction of the Court to hear this case

[34] Ms. Anderson also seeks a declaration that the British Columbia Supreme Court does not have jurisdiction to try Counts 1 and 2 until after the Tax Court of Canada determines the exact amount of tax she has allegedly evaded. She cites s. 12(1) of the Tax Court of Canada Act, R.S.C. 1985, c. T-2, as authority for this proposition. That section provides that the Tax Court “has exclusive original jurisdiction to hear and determine references and appeals to the Court on matters arising under the … Income Tax Act”.

[35] Ms. Anderson’s understanding is not correct. This jurisdictional issue was canvassed and dismissed by Bauman C.J.B.C. in R. v. McCartie, 2012 BCSC 928 (CanLII):

[11] I agree with the essence of the Crown’s submission at para. 22 of its argument:

[22] … The Redpath decision does not anywhere indicate that tax evasion charges should proceed in the Tax Court. Nowhere does the decision say that the provincial-level courts are without jurisdiction to try a criminal tax evasion case. Rather, the decision stands for the proposition that civil taxation questions should not be adjudicated in the criminal process.

[12] A similar view was taken by Justice Myers in R. v. Lawson, 2012 BCSC 356 (CanLII), where the taxpayers similarly brought application to quash tax evasion charges. They, too, raised the taxability/jurisdiction argument. Justice Myers rejected that submission as premature (at para. 20):

[20] I do not agree that the Crown is obliged to seek a remedy in tax court rather than launch a prosecution for tax evasion. There have been several cases in which the Crown has obtained convictions for tax evasion and failure to remit GST. While Mr. Lawson cited cases in which the courts have acquitted on charges of tax evasion and remarked in their decisions that the Crown should have pursued the matter in tax court as a collection matter; that is, a decision that is made at a trial or preliminary inquiry. It is not for this Court to pre-determine that issue by way of a motion for a prerogative remedy.

[13] In my view, that disposes of this aspect of the applicants’ argument.

[36] Moreover, a criminal court may determine the amount of tax allegedly evaded for the purpose of sentencing: see R. v. Alexander Street Lofts Development Corp., 2007 ONCA 309 (CanLII), leave to appeal ref’d [2007] S.C.C.A. No. 378, at paras. 28-31. Thus, if Ms. Anderson is convicted, and were the court to assess a fine, the court would have to determine the total amount of taxes evaded.

[37] There is no merit in Ms. Anderson’s position on this point.

http://canlii.ca/t/gkkbp

So he was not going to listen to any jurisdictional arguments. As the hearing later showed that didn't stop Millar and Lawson from making them ad nauseam.

So then Lawson decided to tell the court about me! "There's a gentleman in the public gallery who is detailing these hearings in his blog so I want the court to include him in the publication ban." Apparently I'm moving up in his estimate because last week he only described me as an "individual". Crown did not have any objection because this hearing was already covered by the previous bans since evidence was being entered. So they were fine with Lawson's request and I was banned yet again, this time for all three defendants. As with the ban last week the court used it's "inherent jurisdiction". So a word about inherent jurisdiction. The Supreme court of British Columbia is the highest level of trial court in the province of British Columbia. So any legal issues not covered by the lower courts are automatically covered by the Supreme Court's inherent jurisdiction. A pretty sweet deal for the Supreme Court judges. This wasn't the end of the day's discussion about the issue of the publication ban. The judge would keep returning to me during the course of the day.

I'll give my understanding of the law respecting publication bans since it seems to be suddenly and unexpectedly affecting me very intimately. Firstly as I understand it the ban only applies to jury trials. The intent is to stop jurors or potential jurors from being unfairly prejudiced against the defendants by something they have read in the media. So the ban only applies to jury trials on the assumption that judges are beyond being influenced by the gutter press. The "standard" ban covered by the legislation allows judges to impose a ban that covers two circumstances;

1 - Reporting on the actual trial in progress.
2 - Reporting on pre-trial hearings where evidence is submitted to the court.

So the hearing last week was not subject to the existing publication ban until the judge extended it because it was pre-trial, not trial, and no evidence was entered.

Today's extended ban was totally pointless because all three defendants already have standard bans which preclude me from posting anything about the current hearing because of prohibition 2. The bans are individually automatically lifted when the respective juries go into deliberations but I can't post anything about these joint hearings until all three trials are concluded since posting about one of them is posting about all of them. I already knew this before today's hearing but the judge decided to spell it out for me anyhow when he expanded the ban today. On top of that there was an orange sign on the registrar's table facing the public seating saying "BAN IN EFFECT"

So we finally got started with the Crown's submissions. The Crown's application was to have the judge approve the use of the documents seized during the search of Porisky's house. Specifically Two folders taken from a filing cabinet, one with Lawson's name on it the other with Millar's. They wanted them excluded from the hearsay rules and allowed as business documents.

Here is my understanding of the hearsay and business document issues. Generally document have to be proven because they are hearsay. This involves getting the maker of the document to testify that he produced it. Obviously this is impossible if large quantities of business records are involved. To start with there is the sheer volume. And, generally, it's not possible to identify who produced specific records or even if actual people did it rather than computers. It is also assumed that business records are correct, that's the whole point of having them. So a hearsay exception is made for them. These are the American rules on it, I assume Canadian rules are similar.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_ ... _exception

So the Crown argued that the seized records were business records and therefore not hearsay. Counsel ran through the general types of documents seized. The first category of documents were contracts between Paradigm and Millar/Lawson and between Millar/Lawson and their students. The second category were invoices, generally for Paradigm products and fees.

The Crown also wanted to avoid having to use the best evidence rule which required that the original document seized be used at trial. Judge cut in to note that counsel was not including Debbie Anderson in their arguments. Counsel said that it wasn't necessary since she was not contesting the application. Back on track the originals were not available because they were still in the custody of the Supreme Court of British Columbia pending the end of the Porisky/Gould trial. While the trial itself was concluded and verdicts reached the case wasn't over until their sentencing on May 24th and the Crown didn't want to prejudice a jury (I assume Lawson's jury since his trial is scheduled prior to Porisky sentencing) by having to tell them why original evidence not available.

Crown said that these documents were produced in the usual and ordinary course of Paradigm's business. Paradigm was a business in a broad sense. The judge agreed that Paradigm was a business since it produced and sent invoices.

We had to stand down at this point because of technical problems. Crown couldn't get samples of documents being considered up on the computer screens. Turned out to be a faulty cable and back at it at 11:00. Crown went through some of Lawson's educator documents seized at Porisky residence which detailed the terms of agreement between Lawson, Millar, and Paradigm. She quoted one line that said that they must act with the highest standards of ethics. Lawson cut in to say that he didn't know what Paradigm is. Judge told him he could cover that at trial. Right now they were just here to discuss "broad brush" availability of evidence. Crown agreed and said that it would be up to the jury to determine relevance of the documents.

The Crown was trying to connect documents seized at the Porisky residence with document seized at the Lawson and Millar residences. There were no bank documents seized at Lawson's home however the Canada Revenue Agency got them from the bank and they matched up to amounts in documents from Porisky search. Now 11:30 and break.

After break on to Millar documents. There are a number of Millar students who will testify at his trial on their contracts and dealings with him. I assume that they will verify their identities in the documents and attach them to Millar. Then a detailed walk through the seized Porisky documents trying to connect them to Millar. A lot of them were signed or came from "Spencer" which happens to be Millar's middle name. Crown suggested that these were documents prepared by Millar and sent to Porisky. I believe there were also bank records seized at Millar's home which matched up to at least some of the Porisky invoices. The Crown submitted that the accused were the authors of the documents and that the folders seized from the house were business documents.

Then lunch break. I headed off to Burnaby Hobbies, a 20 minute Skytrain ride and walk away so I skipped lunch. As I was walking to the Skytrain Station I noticed the three Crown counsel just going into a Japanese restaurant just by the station. Millar, Anderson and Lawson were walking behind me and they ended up in the same restaurant.

After lunch judge asked if we were on record. When it was confirmed that we were he said that, before we started again, he wanted to add a comment regarding the publication ban. He'd been giving it thought over lunch and decided, as best I understood it, to stipulate that there might be circumstances where it might not be necessary to wait until the last of the three trials was heard before lifting the ban. He said he wanted to allow for some flexibility. I had no idea what he meant but a lawyer I asked told me that he simply added a proviso to allow the order to be varied by further order of the court. Then back to business but there was still more about the ban later in the day.

Crown now into legal arguments. We set up the context (where records stored) and content (what records) so court should have no problem finding that the documents were business records. Crown submits that these were entirely normal types of business records. The issue for this vior dire is the admissibility of these records as business records. The reliability and weight to be given to the documents will be for the jury to decide. In respect to the joint written response by Millar and Lawson opposing the application the court has no jurisdiction to review the first part (I think this was the argument that the Supreme Court of British Columbia doesn't exist). That is for the trial judge. True enough, we have a two day hearing scheduled next week to thrash that one out. The defendants are making privacy claims that these are not business documents. They are implicitly suggesting some form of ownership of the documents suggesting some form of privilege. It is the Crown's position that there is no privilege. Lawson and Millar have not made any Charter arguments and have not argued that copies are unreliable. They have not argued that the documents are hearsay or irrelevant. It is the Crown's submission that the documents should be ruled admissible in the trials and accepted as business documents. Then Crown done.

The Crowns submission had been boring but that is the very nature of properly done legal submissions. It had been routine but logical and to the point. It flowed in a linear manner and made sense. Once the defendants started speaking all sense, relevance, logic and linear thinking fled the courtroom and didn't return. As crazed a session as I've attended with the possible exception of this one;

viewtopic.php?f=48&t=9388&start=260#p165879

Both Lawson and Millar had made written submissions, apparently very lengthy ones. I'm assuming that the arguments they raised orally matched those in their submissions. Lawson went up first. He said that he was unrepresented and he didn't want to make mistakes. So he asked the judge if arguing admissibility of evidence was going to affect his jurisdiction argument. Judge said no, there was no question that this court has jurisdiction for this hearing and the Crown has the right to make the application she has made. What you say here addresses only the issues in this court. Then Lawson brought up the Porisky search warrant and the admissibility of evidence obtained through the warrant. The judge cut him off. The validity of the Porisky search warrant is not relevant here. It has already been found valid and you can't argue it. The legality of the warrant is not a relevant issue here. If there was no finding in Porisky's case on the validity of the search warrant then it is already legally decided. All that is relevant in this court is whether the documents with your name on them are relevant in this court. It is not more complicated than that. The jury will decide on the totality of the evidence. These documents will be part of that totality. This voir dire is not to determine the weight to be given to the documents but whether they are relevant.

But Lawson couldn't leave the Porisky search warrant alone. He kept going back to it unconvinced that he couldn't get it thrown out by the court and the evidence obtained by it excluded. "Since Porisky's trial is concluded if we find a defect in the warrant would that be material here?" Judge "The legality of the search warrant is not relevant here even if it is faulty on it's face. It was relevant at Porisky's trial and not brought up. Even if you found minor errors in the warrant it would not be relevant anyhow because courts don't reverse on minor mistakes or defects."

Lawson seemed stunned by this and asked for a few moments to regroup so Millar took over. Judge encouraged Millar and Lawson to read out their submissions into the record. So Millar read what were essentially a few bullet points of it to kick-start his verbal rant. This report only captures part of Millar's statements because, once he was on a roll and got excited, it wasn't possible to do a complete transcript. At least not possible for me. Millar had bigger goals that the admissibility of a few documents. He wanted the whole trial tossed out because of fraudulent conduct by the Crown! The majority of his comments were complaints about how he wasn't being given fundamental justice and how mistreated he was by the Crown and the court. His fundamental justice argument seemed to be that the case had not been thrown out after he'd demanded it be thrown out. Unless he was allowed to unilaterally dismiss all the charges against him his rights had been irreparably violated. We got a lot of that, generally in an angry semi-rant in this session so I'll leave it out of the rest of this report.

Before Millar started the judge said "I want to caution you, I can't make it clearer, I don't want any submissions on jurisdiction wasting the court's time. There is clearly no question that the court has jurisdiction to hear this application". Good luck with that judge!

Millar replied "I have difficulty with that because it is straightforward to read the law and see that it hasn't been complied with. The application does not give the Crown standing to have jurisdiction to make it. A plain reading shows that it black and white that the Crown has no jurisdiction". Millar was like that all the way through the rest of the afternoon. Making the most preposterous statements with an absolute certainty that he fully understood the law and was instructing the judge.

The judge's response was "That is a general statement with no evidence." But Millar was already getting agitated. "They (Crown) are not in compliance with the law. And what about the territorial issue?" "What territorial issue?" Something about the County Boundaries Act and jurisdiction. Judge said "You don't understand Mr. Millar that the Supreme Court has jurisdiction over all of British Columbia". Millar wasn't having any of that nonsense.

Millar - The Crown hasn't established that proceedings are taking place in British Columbia. Criminal proceedings don't allow just upper case.

Judge - That's totally immaterial
Millar - That's just one example.
Judge - The rest better be better.
Millar - The legislation makes plain procedures and the prosecution is not using the prescribed styling.
Judge - If I tell you that I don't want to hear any more I want you to respect that and stop because you are wasting court time.

I was actually disappointed. I thought Millar might have something novel but he's living in the past, way, way in the past, flogging old already discredited arguments. This was what he was arguing, Some of the documents prepared by the Crown had styled the court as THE SUPREME COURT OF BRITISH COLUMBIA but section 2(1) of the Supreme Court Act says;

2(1) The Supreme Court of British Columbia is continued under the name and style of the "Supreme Court of British Columbia".

And that was his whole point. The case against him had to be thrown out because the Crown had committed the criminal offense of using only upper case in some of their filings when the statute, in his dream world, required the use of both upper and lower cases for everything. Once, when freemen were young and vigorous and bursting with new ideas this was a crowd pleaser, a clear winner. Until it took a shit-kicking in court. Repeatedly. It's about as relevant today as this would be if it suddenly showed up on your television set.



I suppose that we need to show some charity here. Millar is getting on but is still living in a past when all things were still possible. Like so many of us he doesn't recognize that time has passed him by. His glory days were back in the old detaxer period of the late 1990s, early 2000's. Essentially all of the arguments he presented in court today came from that time period and are classic but failed old-school OPCA strategies. But Millar can't see it, he's too committed to his past investment in all of this to realize that it's dead and gone. The circus has folded it's tents and moved on but Millar is still standing in the fairground waiting hopefully for the clowns and elephants.

Over a year ago I posted the results of a trial hearing argued on this exact same basis on the use of upper and lower cases when using the name of the Supreme Court of British Columbia. It was a completely trivial local case I attended; Master Gee and his issues with paying his annual Burnaby business license fee;

viewtopic.php?f=48&t=10342

Master Gee used exactly the same argument as Millar except he expanded it to cover the CITY OF BURNABY too. I wrote;

Gildemeester immediately presented himself to the court as a private person acting in a private capacity and started arguing that the court didn't actually exist because its name on all the documents was in capital letters but in section 2.1 of the Supreme court of British Columbia Act it was in upper and lower case. He said he couldn't "relax" in court because the City of Burnaby was also styled in all capital letters in the various documents whereas it was in upper and lower case on the city website. Same with his and his wife's names. Everywhere he looked it was a fictitious alternate world of all capital letters. He wanted the court to issue an order that the documents all had to be changed to mixed case and that the court confirm that it was actually the Supreme Court of British Columbia acting as a Section 2.1 court. If it didn't his rights were not being respected. He said the fact that none of the documentation correctly identified the parties was a HUGE issue. He again demanded a court order. Judge wasn't buying it and refused saying that the capitalization issue was irrelevant. Well then, Gildemeester said, the case is over because it can't proceed if the parties and court are styled incorrectly. Judge said "We are proceeding". "You're going ahead?" Mark asked incredulously. The judge said he'd already ruled against him so the issue was finished. Mark rebutted by saying that this caused him to question the legitimacy of the proceedings. He kept going over and over the issue (at least it was an issue to him) about how neither Burnaby nor the court existed because of all those capital letters.

So Mark then demanded that the judge confirm that this was actually the Supreme Court of British Columbia. Judge responded "You know what court you are in". The judge said he hadn't memorized the Supreme Court of British Columbia Act so he had no idea what section 2.1 said but this was the Supreme Court of British Columbia. Mark accused the judge of sidestepping the issue. Mark said the judge was not willing to make him feel "safe" by confirming for the record that this was the real Supreme Court in adherence to 2.1 of the Supreme Court of British Columbia Act because this was obviously a court unknown to law "I don't want to participate in this court, I want to participate in a lawful court". Judge said "If you don't want to proceed that's fine but this application is proceeding regardless of your participation"

The judge stated in his decision;

[11] Mr. Gildemeester also objects that the petition refers to this court as THE SUPREME COURT OF BRITISH COLUMBIA and that the proper name and style of the court is The Supreme Court of British Columbia. He makes the same objection about the City of Burnaby, based on their letters patent. He accuses the City of Burnaby of fraud. He also asserts that the City of Burnaby is on unceded First Nations lands. He has provided evidence that a person Mr. Gildemeester says is an Elder of the Squamish Nation has given him permission to use the land in this fashion.

[12] These defences are without merit. Mr. Gildemeester operates a business in the City of Burnaby. He is required to have a business licence. He is no different from other persons operating businesses in the City.

But past, failed cases mean nothing to Michael. He didn't argue them in court. This is a new day when dead arguments are miraculously resurrected!

He pulled out some unidentified document and said that the styling on it was in both upper and lower case. Then he started in on how he was here by Special Appearance. Judge told him to stop because special appearances were not recognized by this court. So Millar shifted to discussing the "defective fraudulent material" submitted by the Crown. "All documents related to me are a nullity because of defects". They'd failed to state the name of a court known to law. They'd also failed to stipulate his legal status. "The prosecution has had time to correct this and they've refused and caused irreparable prejudice against me". He used the phrase "irreparable prejudice against me" numerous times but I'm not going to repeat them all. He did a lot of ranting about his fundamental right to justice being denied due to the actions of the Crown and court and kept demanding that he receive the justice due to him which, apparently, was whatever justice he thought was due him. He said that the court had no jurisdiction because of these defects. If they were known to the public known they would shock the conscience of the community and bring the administration of justice into disrepute. He used the phrase "shock the conscience of the community and bring the administration of justice into disrepute" a number of times. It crossed my mind that the reason that the public doesn't know about the injustices being relentlessly inflicted on him was due to the publication bans which were imposed at the defendant's requests. Otherwise I'd be happy to shock the conscience of the community on his behalf by reporting how he is being martyred. Although Lawson had asked for today's publication ban I'm assuming that he did so on Millar's instructions. So Millar is actually acting against his best interests by having the ban.

The babbling by Millar about not knowing who or where he is because the Crown refuses to tell him. This goes back to comments he made in his December 9, 2015 hearing.

He said documents are invalidated in substance and form because of the case issue and are a nullity. He wanted a an order from the court of defining the "legal nature" of the plaintiff and defendant are because he doesn't know. Is the Crown acting against him as a private person? As the Michael Millar Trust? As the flesh and blood natural man? If the court doesn't do this the proceedings are a fraud.

Is this proceeding in common law, law of equity, admiralty law? The Crown won't say and I don't know so I can't get a fair trial. Court has been mislead by Crown's paperwork and I'm not getting fundamental justice.

Judge - What order are you asking me to make? I want an order saying whether this action is taking place against a private person or the officer and trustee of a trust. I want to know if it is common law, or admiralty law. There is no reason for a trial all the documents are a nullity all of the documents are a fraud.

Some rambling about how the Crown is trying to sneak some documents into court that don't match the documents served to him. Not explained but I assume a styling issue. I need guidance from the court. Is this proceeding as a trust matter or common law? What about the Michael Millar trust? The Crown is claiming that these are proceedings against the private flesh and blood man but they are really dealings against the Michael Millar trust. So it is a matter of equity. Unless the court spells this out I can't get a fair hearing.

Judge asked Crown counsel if she could write a letter answering Millar's questions. Sure but he won't be satisfied. The Crown does not recognize him as a trust, private person. None of this is recognized in Canadian law. He'll just argue against font styling again. There are no defects in the indictment. Judge told her to write the letter to Millar and he can argue it and she will make a ruling. Lawyer said she could but it wouldn't make any difference.

So I assume that if the Crown had sent him the requested letter it hadn't satisfied his demands that they tell him who he is.

Then on to his private person routine. "All of the records should be excluded because they are private documents of private persons acting in their private status and are outside of the jurisdiction of the court." He said he wanted all of the documents covered by the application excluded because they are private rather than commercial and public. "This issue has been willfully evaded and avoided by the CRA. It is clear that the documents seized are private because they say so on their face and are therefore outside of the jurisdiction of the court." What he is referring to is a notation that Porisky put on each individual document that it was a private document. That, apparently, is a magical talisman that bars them from being used by the Canada Revenue Agency, the Department of Justice, and the courts.

At this point he was going way to fast for me to keep up and it was the same stuff anyhow. On and on about the legal magic of putting the word "private" on documents. He was just ranting about the legal status of persons and his inability to find out from the Crown or the court who he is. The judge just sat there and let it wash over him for a while then he said that it was of no relevance. "Do you have any problem with the words "Supreme Court of British Columbia"? How are you prejudiced by "The Supreme Court" instead of "Supreme Court?"".

This comment related to yet another argument that Millar had thrown into the mix. As I've noted the Supreme Court Act says;

2 (1) The Supreme Court of British Columbia is continued under the name and style of the "Supreme Court of British Columbia".

Note the quotation marks around Supreme Court of British Columbia. This meant, in Millar's dream world, that if a document had the word "the" in front of the words "Supreme Court" that it referred to yet another separate Supreme Court. To this point Millar has identified the existence of three entirely different Supreme Courts;

- Supreme Court of British Columbia
- The Supreme Court of British Columbia
- SUPREME COURT OF BRITISH COLUMBIA

And maybe even;

- THE SUPREME COURT OF BRITISH COLUMBIA

And nobody will tell him which one he is in. So his plaintive response in answer to the judge's above question about how he was prejudiced was "I don't know what court I'm in." All the judge said to help him with his identity crisis was "Go on to the next point. I've told you that you are not going to get any traction from this point."

So he moved on to the seal of the Supreme Court and some issue about the words on it. I didn't catch the issue. He said that the words on the seal don't match the Supreme Court Act so I assume it's just another argument about upper and lower cases. Judge - Go on to next point.

So he argued the failure to define the lawful place to establish the judicial district. His words not mine. Something about the county of Vancouver vs. the Vancouver Judicial District. He said that the Supreme Court Act screwed this up so there are no judicial districts and no Supreme Court. So he has shifted from claiming that there are multiple Supreme Courts of British Columbia to none at all. "I want to be assured that we are actually in a judicial district defined by law. So where are we? The Crown refused to answer that question so they are holding this hearing in a different court". Judge - Next point.

But Millar was too excited about the current point to move on. "I'm seeking the administration of justice and this isn't met if we don't know where we are". Then something about how the court has no jurisdiction over the seas. Happily this did not lead to a rant about maritime or admiralty laws. "The prosecution wants to prosecute me in a fictitious jurisdiction". Move on.

I've never heard the word "county" applied to Vancouver or the province of British Columbia so I looked the issue up in Wikipedia;

The BCSC sits in eight judicial districts called "counties". This is the only usage of "county" in British Columbia, which is a reference only to such court districts and has no similarity to the meaning in other provinces or in the United States or the United Kingdom. Prior to 1990, there existed in British Columbia a County Court, an intermediate court between the Provincial Court and the BCSC. In 1990, the County Court of B.C. merged with the BCSC and its judges became justices of the BCSC. The judicial districts of the Supreme Court have the same boundaries of the counties of the former County Court.

The judicial districts are: Cariboo; Kootenay; Nanaimo; Prince Rupert; Vancouver; Victoria; Westminster; and Yale. The Counties of Vancouver and Westminster are collectively one judicial district under the name of the "Vancouver Westminster Judicial District".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supreme_C ... h_Columbia


So I assume that Millar believes he has found some error in the boundary definitions based on counties vs. judicial districts. Lawson has a two day jurisdictional hearing slated for next week on what appears to be exactly this point so I may get some further insight there.

Then something about the Crown having avoided using prescribed forms which moved them from a lawful court to an illegal court. Back to upper and lower cases and claimed minor errors in the documents which voided them. Apparently the Crown's documents don't adhere to the rules that Millar has pulled out of his ass about the usage of various cases in various documents. Judge - Move on to next point.

But he wasn't finished with his obsession about cases quite yet. Something about how names and style on criminal release and parole documents didn't style his name correctly leaving his status unknown because the name used for him is not known to law. There is a lack of legal clarity regarding the legal nature of Michael Spencer Millar. Sometimes it is in upper case and sometimes in mixed case. Each refers to a different person. Which Michael Spencer Millar is the Crown charging?

Then a long, barely coherent harangue about the incompetent, corrupt Crown counsel. Keep in mind I'm only relating a fraction of what he said. He was on an afternoon-long rant and there was no way to keep up and, really, there was no purpose in trying anyhow.

Back yet again to upper and lower case. Unless the forms submitted by the Crown followed the exact correct styling the paperwork did not invoke a lawful court. "All I want to do is confirm that I am in a lawful court in a lawful district."

Then Lawson popped up, apparently recovered from his prior defeat. "I'd like to put on the record about the court's comment that there are no such things as special appearances. That is not what Justice Cullin said so, for the record, there are special appearances." Judge responded "I don't know what Justice Cullin said but it doesn't apply here". So Lawson changed gears and said that the documents to be ruled on, including those taken under the Porisky search warrant, do not meet the requirements of the Criminal Code. He said "You've been curt with Mr. Millar so I won't read everything into the record". Judge said that he'd read Lawson's submissions and there was a lot of repetition with Millar. Back to the Crown's documents having substantial defects. So documents are void and ultra vires. Are we in a proper law process? Then back, yet again, to jurisdiction. Crown has used illegal names and styles for the Supreme Court. The judge said that if judges paid attention to these things no self-represented litigant would get a hearing in court. Lawson said that the Crown won't admit that we are in a lawful jurisdiction. Judge - "It is clear that you are in the lawful jurisdiction for this case. Mr. Millar's arguments actually undermine his position. The forms are not mandatory as long as they cover essential matters." Lawson - "If this is an innocent error of the Crown they should clear it up. They haven't done so it is fraud." Judge - "There is nothing wrong with the form of the indictment."

Lawson said that he'd read in some book that if you capitalized the word "city" it indicated a corporate status. So the city of Vancouver is the actually physical city but the City of Vancouver is a corporation. So, are cities places or corporations? "Are we talking about places when we talk about the Supreme Court's jurisdiction or are we in corporations?" Judge said "I can't see how you are confused about this."

So back to the old and familiar "The mandatory forms have not been complied with". Judge - "They are not mandatory, they are prescribed. They are to give guidance and it is wrong to say that they are required." Then Lawson went off on a ramble about how he is being prejudiced because he doesn't know where he is or how he can defend himself. The judge said "The Court considers the substance of forms not the precise form. You've gone to a lot of trouble but nothing that I've heard applies to the court having jurisdiction." Lawson wanted judge to confirm that we were in a lawful court. Judge said "You are in the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court and always have been so stop asking me about Section 2 of the Act and don't ask me again if you are in the Supreme Court."

Lawson asked for a break for a moment so judge decided to take the opportunity to revisit the publication ban. He asked "Are the two gentlemen in the back members of the press and do they understand the publication ban?". The only other guy in the back was a Department of Justice lawyer who just happened to be sitting in the same row as me so I was the person being addressed. I stood up and said that I was not press, I wrote for a blog. I understood the effect of the ban and did not plan to publish anything during the course of the trials.

Back to Lawson and his private interests. Judge asked "If you put words "private interest" in a document are you saying that it must be considered private?" Yes, the wording means that it doesn't extend to the public. Lawson said that putting the words "without prejudice" on a document also makes them private and they can't be used by the public. Judge said no, it is a term used in negotiations so that offers can't be used against you later if negotiations fail. "You can't write "Without Prejudice" on documents and exclude them from criminal investigations."

So Lawson argued that Paradigm can't be considered a business because it wasn't registered somewhere or another as a legal person. Judge said it didn't matter what Paradigm was since Porisky had been charged personally so it makes no difference to your situation what Paradigm is.

It was now 4PM and everybody had had their say. So judge said he would give his oral decision at 10 tomorrow morning and we'd be done by lunch. He will provide written reasons for judgment later.

A note about presenting styles. While the two defendant's arguments were almost identical their way of presenting them was entirely different. Lawson was at least calm and composed. Millar was very agitated, indignant at being here and having his arguments opposed by the Crown and angry at the Crown for persecuting him even though he's proven to them that they have no case against him. The two Crown counsels responded to him by ignoring him and keeping focused on business.

Millar's basic position seems to be that if an "i" isn't dotted or if, somewhere in all the documents, a "t" isn't crossed correctly or a word is misspelled he has irrefutable proof of the total corruption of the Crown and the case against him must be dismissed. He's claiming an absolute standard of no errors at all. Well, errors as he defines them since styling the court name in capital letters was deliberate. He said that he'd originally thought it was just innocent incompetence on the part of Crown counsel that resulted in all of the improper documents that they'd filed but he now realizes that it is deliberate fraud on the court. So his case must be thrown out because justice demands that the Crown do everything exactly right by a set of standards that Millar has essentially pulled out of his ass.

I would also note that Lawson tried almost of the same arguments out in a Supreme Court of British Columbia hearing four years ago and failed there. They've been fleshed out since then but are essentially the same.

]A. The formal objections

[9] The first formal objection I will deal with is: “a failure to properly identify either of the Applicants by his or her proper name in any of the counts or offences alleged therein.” This is so, Mr. Lawson argued, because his and his wife’s last name are capitalized in the informations and summonses. He cites a literary style guide in support of his argument. There is, of course, no legal requirement as to the capitalization of names in informations, summonses or other court documents. The accused are clearly and properly identified. Style guides are not legal authority, nor are they written as such.

[10] A second formal objection is: “… failure to state the geographic location where each of the alleged offences occurred.” In Mr. Lawson’s supplemental argument he states:
In the Information, neither of the terms “City of Burnaby,” and “Province of British Columbia” expresses a geographic location; i.e. a place, where the alleged offences were committed. The Canadian Style guide's rules for the style of geographical terms, in section 4.21(c), shows that those words are not a location, but are used in a corporate sense.

At the hearing, Mr. Lawson added that he was not a shareholder of Burnaby.

[11] I do not agree with this argument. In their context, the words clearly denote geographic locations.

[12] Furthermore, the courts have taken a dim view of applications to quash informations, summonses and indictments on formal or technical grounds. As Tim Quigley states in Procedure in Canadian Law, 2d ed. (Toronto: Carswell, 2005) at p. 17-2:

[T]he Criminal Code has long sought to reduce the potential for technical defects to halt proceedings and, in recent years, the judiciary has increasingly stressed this aim. There is a marked preference for amending faulty informations and indictments, rather than to quash them, especially after the Supreme Court decision in R. v. Moore [(1998), 1988 CanLII 43 (SCC), 65 C.R. (3d) 1].
...
The position now is that only an indictment or information that discloses no offence known to law or is so badly drafted that it fails to provide notice of the offence charged will be quashed and then only if it cannot be amended.

II. Other relief sought

[25] The first order sought is a declaration:

… that the court which will hear this application is the same Honorable Court having the name and style "Supreme Court of British Columbia" (the "Court"), as continued by s.2(1) of the Supreme Court Act, (R.S.B.C., 1996);

[26] In his supplemental argument Mr. Lawson argues that if the declaration is not granted there is:

…. the potential that the public will begin to perceive that if no lawful superior court exists in which people can have a reasonable expectation of the equal protection of law, as provided for by the Canadian Bill of Rights, then they will no longer seek to have their disputes and grievances settled in the courts, but will be more likely to take matters into their own hands to obtain justice by more swift and certain means against perceived adversaries and oppressors.

Earlier in his argument he refers to “YouTube” videos showing people swarming the courts of England “to demand justice and chasing judges from the bench.” There is a reference to the “public, who are paying close attention to this and related proceedings in growing numbers.”

[27] I will give Mr. Lawson the benefit of the doubt and assume that this was not meant as a veiled threat. Even so, the argument is not helpful, constructive or appropriate.

[28] There is no doubt that this is the Supreme Court of British Columbia, and no issue has been raised with respect to this Court’s constitution or jurisdiction, of which the Lawsons chose to avail themselves. The motion is unnecessary and frivolous, and is dismissed.

[29] The second order sought is:

an order confirming that this Court recognizes each of the Applicants in propria persona, and each having the status of a private person, also known as a natural person, at common law for the purposes of these proceedings.

According to Mr. Lawson, this request was made of the Associate Chief Justice at the pre-application hearing and denied. I reach the same conclusion. This has no legal merit. The Lawsons are named individuals. There is no basis for the recognition of any special status, nor does one exist for them. There are no separate laws, rules, rights, remedies or procedures applicable to “natural persons” versus other individuals, or, for the sake of completeness, individual persons. In line with this, I order that the reference to “private person” following the applicants’ names in the style of cause be struck.

[33] The fifth and sixth orders are related and can be dealt with together. They are:

• an order directing that each registry location of the Supreme Court of British Columbia shall ensure that it has a proper court seal, in accordance with s. 7(1) of the Supreme Court Act, (RSBC, 1996), having the proper name and style of the court, as set out in s. 2(1) of that Act;

• an order recognizing that the application filed by Applicants in this Court does not bear the proper seal of the Supreme Court of British Columbia, as set out in ss. 7(1) and 2(1) of the Supreme Court Act, (RSBC, 1996), and a further order declaring that the lack of the proper seal of the Court, or the use of an improper seal, shall by order of this Court be deemed to be an irregularity that shall have no adverse effect on the substance, jurisdiction, or otherwise in respect of this application, because the Applicants were informed by the court registry that the proper court seal was not in the possession of the registry of this Court, although the Applicants did insist that the proper court seal be used to file this application;

[34] There is no relation between this issue and the validity of the Information or summonses. If the Lawsons have any standing to raise this issue, this is not the proper procedure in which to do it. These applications are therefore dismissed.

R. v. Lawson, 2012 BCSC 356
http://canlii.ca/t/fqhb6



Wednesday March 23, 2016

Back in court but first a chat with Keith Lawson. I was reading the court calendar posted in the courthouse lobby when Lawson came up behind me saying "Hello Michael, oh, you're not Michael." Quite right, I'm not currently charged with any criminal offenses and facing trial. Lawson asked me what my position was on his case. I told him that I spent 35 years as an income tax auditor which should fully explain my position. He claims not to have read any of my Quatloos postings or even know what Quatloos is. Do you own it? Is it subscription? He said that he only knows about Quatloos from friends who've told him that I post about him on it. The only person I've written about who has actually admitted that he read my postings about him was the Chief. All the rest tell me they don't have time, it's not worth the bother, my posts are all lies anyhow.

When I told Lawson that I write about freemen and tax evaders he professed not to know what freemen are and said that he had no idea if Paradigm was based on freeman beliefs. I told him that Porisky's natural person argument was pure freeman and that Millar at least was arguing old freeman concepts in court. I told him it didn't matter to his prosecution since the crown seemed to be just treating him as an everyday tax evader. He said he'd attended some of the Porisky trial but apparently not on the days I attended. He went the first week and I went the second. He was surprised that Porisky offered no defense at all (as was I) and said that he'd tried to contact Porisky but it seems that Porisky had severed any connection with his followers. A pleasant enough chat, I told him I appreciated being upgraded from an individual to a gentleman. Then off to court.

Debbie Anderson did not attend today. Only other spectator was an older guy in a suit who I've seen at a few other Poriskyite hearings and who knows Lawson and Millar. No idea who he is. (Note - This is what I wrote at the time of the hearing. I've later learned that he's Lawson's father) The judge was going to give his decision today. I didn't expect any suspense about the results, it was pretty clear by the end of yesterday that the application would be approved. We got the same private person in private capacity special appearance routine from Lawson and Millar when judge came in. Before we got going some paperwork issues to do with sorting out submissions. Then Lawson had a question. Was this hearing proceeding under the authority of Section 2(1) of the Supreme Court Act? As I posted yesterday this is 2(1);

2 (1) The Supreme Court of British Columbia is continued under the name and style of the "Supreme Court of British Columbia".

Judge said no, it was proceeding under the authority of the Income Tax Act and (I believe) the Criminal Code of Canada. Then Lawson asked something I didn't get. Judge just said "I want to get along with this matter, anything else?" Lawson said that he was not properly identified in the paperwork. Judge said that his name and address were on it and that was enough. Judge told him that the court was properly constituted and "it is so fundamental and so basic that there is no point in discussing this further". Judge got started. "This application is about the admissibility and use of written and computer documents." He noted that the documents had come from Porisky's house and that Porisky and Gould had both just been convicted of tax evasion and Porisky of counseling tax evasion. "This application is limited to determining the admissibility of two educator files to be admitted to trial of the accused."

He said that he noted for the record that Debbie Anderson, on advice of counsel, was not contesting the Crown's application. However his order would apply to all three defendants. This voir dire is specifically in respect to documents found in folders in Porisky's house during the CRA search and seizure. There were three folders, each with a defendant's name on them. Anderson's folder contained 305 pages in pdf format. Millar's folder contained 336 pages in pdf format. Lawson's folder contained 193 pages in pdf format. Then "Crown's application is granted. Crown is to draft the order for me to sign. Written reasons to follow."

So hearing was over but Lawson suddenly stood up to say something as judge was leaving. Sheriff got up and stood beside him but he didn't say anything as judge left. Turned out to just be a minor quibble he had about some documents. He, Crown counsel and the registrar corrected it and we were done, all in twenty minutes.

[Burnaby49]

BREAKING NEWS! LAWSON WAS THE VICTIM OF ENTRAPMENT BY THE CROWN!!!!

It's all laid out in damning detail here;

https://canadaincometaxislegal.is/keith ... ntrapment/

Of course "Apu", who's theory proves that Keith is innocent, isn't exactly a disinterested party. He's Eric Ho, another Poriskyite counselor who fled the country just ahead of being caught and is now hiding out in Hong Kong;

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=11166

[notorial dissent]

Sounds like the usual tax cheat quibbling and nonsense to me.

[Burnaby49]

I'm just back from Lawson's sentencing hearing. Eighteen months jail time and 100% fine on taxes evaded. I'll write a full report later. The judge read the decision from her written draft and when it is released (soon apparently) it will be very thorough. She took over an hour and a quarter of solid reading to get through it. So anything in my write-up can be taken as just a preliminary review. A couple of things stand out.

1 - Judge didn't believe his theatrical show of remorse at his prior sentencing hearing any more than I did. She said outright she didn't believe him and essentially said that he might have been sorry for getting caught but not for what he did. She said that she didn't accept that he'd changed his beliefs at all.

2 - Readers who have followed this discussion have noted how I've ranted about Lawson's hypocritical position in using massive amounts of free, at least free to him, government funded health care while actively doing his best to criminally evade paying any taxes that might help at least partially fund it. He kept claiming at trial that he's an honourable man but his hypocritical, completely self-serving behaviour shows otherwise.

The judge considered his health problems as a possible mitigating circumstance in respect to imposing jail time. He'd argued that he shouldn't go to jail because of inadequate health care there and how he need to be constantly near a hospital in case of emergency. He lives close to Burnaby General, my hospital too. The judge listed his surgeries, hospital stays, emergencies, and other treatments in her decision. An impressive and harrowing list. He is really suffering serious health problems and I thought they'd get him off. But the judge sent him to jail anyhow with these comforting words;

"The taxpayer-funded medical system will take care of him while he's incarcerated."

[Burnaby49]

Finally, after all these years, Keith Lawson's sentencing hearing. And it has been years. I first mentioned him in March 2012, shortly after I'd started posting on Quatloos. So its been over four and a half years since I started reporting on his case. He was the first Poriskyite I followed and I knew little about the scam at the time. I've learned much since, a lot of it from Lawson. My first posting on him already showed their hallmark obsessions;

[9] The first formal objection I will deal with is: "a failure to properly identify either of the Applicants by his or her proper name in any of the counts or offences alleged therein." This is so, Mr. Lawson argued, because his and his wife's last name are capitalised in the informations and summonses. He cites a literary style guide in support of his argument. There is, of course, no legal requirement as to the capitalisation of names in informations, summonses or other court documents. The accused are clearly and properly identified. Style guides are not legal authority, nor are they written as such.

[10] A second formal objection is: "... failure to state the geographic location where each of the alleged offences occurred." In Mr. Lawson's supplemental argument he states:

In the Information, neither of the terms "City of Burnaby," and "Province of British Columbia" expresses a geographic location; i.e. a place, where the alleged offences were committed. The Canadian Style guide's rules for the style of geographical terms, in section 4.21(c), shows that those words are not a location, but are used in a corporate sense.

At the hearing, Mr. Lawson added that he was not a shareholder of Burnaby.

[11] I do not agree with this argument. In their context, the words clearly denote geographic locations.

[21] That is sufficient to dismiss the Lawson's' motion on its substantive grounds, but there is more. There were, in fact, ample grounds for the issuing of the informations and summonses and for the Crown to proceed as it did in this case. Prior to the information being sworn, Mr. Lawson had met with the CRA. On October 4, 2011, Mr. Lawson - of his own accord - provided the CRA with an affidavit he had sworn. In it, Mr. Lawson says that he acted as a "Paradigm Educator" for Mr. Russell Porisky. The clear implication is that he earned money (to use neutral terms) for doing that. The other clear implication is that Mr. Lawson was of the view he did not have to report that money as income because he was a "natural person". The natural person theory is referred to in Mr. Lawson's supplemental written argument.

[22] Mr. Porisky, his alter-ego the "Paradigm Education Group", and the "natural person" taxation argument were the subject of the Porisky judgment I issued on January 18, 2012. In that judgment I concluded that the teachings of Mr. Porisky and Paradigm had no legal validity. I convicted Mr. Porisky of income tax evasion, failure to remit GST and counselling fraud. The second Information in this matter was sworn by the CRA officer on February 1, 2012, and the summonses were issued on February 2 and February 3. Based on Mr. Lawson's affidavit and the Porisky judgment, the information and the summons were fully justified at the time they were issued.

[23] I note that while Mr. Lawson objected when the Crown referred to his involvement with Paradigm at the hearing, it is difficult to conceive why, since his own affidavit in this proceeding put the matter before me.

[29] The second order sought is:

an order confirming that this Court recognizes each of the Applicants in propria persona, and each having the status of a private person, also known as a natural person, at common law for the purposes of these proceedings.

Accompanied by dire threats that the population of Canada would rise up in revolt against the judicial system and attack the courts themselves if he wasn't let off.

26] In his supplemental argument Mr. Lawson argues that if the declaration is not granted there is:

.... the potential that the public will begin to perceive that if no lawful superior court exists in which people can have a reasonable expectation of the equal protection of law, as provided for by the Canadian Bill of Rights, then they will no longer seek to have their disputes and grievances settled in the courts, but will be more likely to take matters into their own hands to obtain justice by more swift and certain means against perceived adversaries and oppressors.

Earlier in his argument he refers to "YouTube" videos showing people swarming the courts of England "to demand justice and chasing judges from the bench." There is a reference to the "public, who are paying close attention to this and related proceedings in growing numbers."

[27] I will give Mr. Lawson the benefit of the doubt and assume that this was not meant as a veiled threat. Even so, the argument is not helpful, constructive or appropriate.

I'd comment that for the public to perceive that no lawful court exists as a result of Lawson's trial the public would first have to be aware that Lawson was on trial. Even to date I see little evidence that the public, even a small portion of the public, is aware that Lawson exists. I'm the solitary voice in the wilderness recording his relentless fight to find a real court that will recognize his private person status.

At least one thing he said in court, in December 2014, proved to be entirely correct;

Actually, from what I was told by a participant at his last hearing which I unfortunately missed, his plaintive cry was something along the lines of;

"Why not just throw me in jail now? Everybody thinks I'm guilty."

All in all a pretty accurate assessment of the situation. However, unless he is willing to plead guilty, we'll just have to wait until March to make it formal. I plan to be there.

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=8223&start=20#p182171

Well nobody thinks he's guilty now. He's been convicted so we know he's guilty. Conjecture has been turned into fact.

So we move forward to today and my pages of notes from the hearing. The judge had a written decision and she read from it. A long written decision. She read without a break for over an hour and a quarter with me desperately trying to keep up. I unavoidably missed a lot but the judge said that, after another run-through for typos and such, the decision will be released. When it is, I'll link to a copy here. Until then you have this report as a general idea of what the judge told us.

Before we start I'll give a rundown on the big issue in this hearing. The potential fine was not an issue. The minimum fine was 100% of the taxes evaded and both Crown and defense recommended this amount. The judge could, I believe, impose a fine of up to 200% but so what? Lawson is broke and hasn't worked at gainful employment in this century. He probably can't cover the 100% fine never mind a higher assessment. And it was certain that he was going to get a jail sentence. The issue was whether he was going to have to serve actual hard-time in a jail or get a conditional sentence. This is a conditional sentence;

Conditional refers to rules the offender must follow in order to remain out of prison, which are similar to when one is on parole.

These are most often treatment for drug or alcohol abuse, curfews, and community service.[1] Offenders who breach their conditions or re-offend may complete their sentence in prison.

To receive a conditional sentence, the sentencing judge must be satisfied that the offender does not pose a danger to the community. This allows less serious offenders to remain in their communities or at home. The largest percentage of conditional sentences are for property crime.[1] By law, a conditional sentence must be less than two years in duration; they have an average length of eight months.,[1] and the offence that the offender was convicted of cannot be punishable by a minimum sentence of imprisonment.

Conditional sentences were introduced in 1995 as a response to perceived over-incarceration, especially among aboriginal Canadians.[2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condition ... e_(Canada)

So the only real issue was jail or house arrest and, whichever was chosen, how long.

I was early so I beat Lawson. When he came in he was accompanied by the Unlicensed Man himself, David-Kevin: Lindsay;

viewtopic.php?f=48&t=10022

Lawson chatted with the sheriff by the door for a few moments about a slight problem. He's already working on his appeal but he expected to be incarcerated today (Great call Keith!) and he had his appeal documents on him. He didn't want to be taken into custody with them so what should he do with them? I think the sheriff said to give them to Lindsay now.

Neither Crown counsel who had soldiered on so long with this case was at counsel's table. I put it that way because one was sitting near me in the public seating. She'd quit federal Crown and was now working for the province but had come to the hearing to see how the case ended. The other counsel was probably busy at some other trial. Crown was represented by a new guy who had transferred from the income tax area of the Department of Justice to criminal.

Apart from David Lindsay, the ex-Crown counsel and myself the only spectators were a CRA auditor from Investigations, Lawson's father, and two young women. I have no idea who they were.

When judge was ready she said that she would read her decision into the record but the reasons should be available this week. She said that before she started she had an administrative issue to discuss regarding any publication bans. She said that she saw no reason for there to be any bans any more so if there were any floating around she'd lift them. So she had the registrar check. Nope, all remaining bans have been removed. Good thing too since I've been reporting Lawson for years on that assumption.

So she got started. First she read out the charges that Lawson had been convicted on. These are;

Count 1 I Chef 1
Keith David LAWSON, at or near the City of Burnaby, in the Province of British Columbia, and elsewhere, between April 15, 2002 and August 26, 2010, did counsel various persons to commit the indictable offence of fraud in excess of five thousand dollars, contrary to section 380 of the Criminal Code, and did thereby commit an offence contrary to section 464(a) of the Criminal Code.

Count 2 I Chef 2
Keith David LAWSON, of the City of Burnaby, Province of British Columbia, between December 31, 2003 and May 1, 2009, did wilfully evade or attempt to evade payment of taxes imposed by the Income Tax Act in the amount of $46, 176.20 by failing to report his taxable income in the amount of $213,2 I 3 .13 for the 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008 taxation years, and did thereby commit an offence contrary to section 239(1)(d) of the said Act.

Count 3 I Chef 3
Keith David LAWSON, of the City of Burnaby, Province of British Columbia, between April 27, 2009 and May l, 2009, did make, or participate in, assent to or acquiesce in, the making of false or deceptive statements in his T 1 Individual Tax Return for the 2008 taxation year, filed as required by the Income Tax Act, by understating his taxable income in the amount of$ 12, 759.56 for the said taxation year, and did thereby commit an offence contrary to section 239(1 )(a) of the said Act.

Count 4 I Chef 4
Keith David LAWSON, of the City of Burnaby, Province of British Columbia, between June 30, 2005 and January I, 2009, did wilfully evade or attempt to evade compliance with the Excise Tax Act or payment or remittance of the Goods and Services Tax, by failing to collect or remit Goods and Services Tax of $12,223.16 on goods and services sold, and did thereby commit an offence contrary to section 327(l)(c) of the said Act.

Judge said that these offenses related to a tax evasion scheme led by Russell Porisky through Paradigm. Mr. Lawson contracted with at least 35 students to teach them the Paradigm theory. The Crown has provided sufficient evidence at trial for the sentencing.

The Crown's position is that there should be a conditional stay on count 3, false statements, because of the conviction on Charge 2. Sections 239(1)(a) and 239(1)(d) shouldn't both be found.

Crown says that a six month sentence on each of charges 2 and 4 to be concurrent and, given Mr. Lawson's financial situation, a minimum fine if 100% of income tax and GST evaded should be imposed. Crown also wants an 18 month sentence for Charge 1, counseling, consecutive to the sentences for Charges 2 and 4 for a total period of incarceration of two years.

Mr. Lawson recommends a conditional sentence of two years less a day (note, it has to be two years less a day or a lesser sentence to qualify Lawson for a conditional sentence) and a fine of 100% of taxes and GST evaded (this is the minimum fine).

Judge read out penalties for the offenses. Took a while. Since these convictions come from a jury trial the facts justifying any sentence must come from the evidence entered at trial. The only evidence entered at the sentencing hearing were letters from Mr. Lawson. He had $313,006 in unreported income. Some technical talk on evidence then the comment that total income taxes that Lawson had evaded were $52,121,54 and GST evaded of $16,067.22.

Paradigm was created by Porisky as an organization to teach others how to defraud the government of Canada. (I only have a portion of what judge said at this point). Mr. Lawson sold Paradigm materials to students and taught Paradigm beliefs. Lawson himself used the Paradigm theory to defraud the government.

The judge quoted paragraphs 15 to 19 of R. v. Porisky, 2016 BCSC 1757;

[15] Mr. Porisky and Ms. Gould derived income from the percentages paid by the educators and students to Paradigm for its material. The material that was seized from the home of Mr. Porisky and Ms. Gould demonstrates that Mr. Porisky taught his scheme on a large scale to at least 30 educators and to 800 students. All of these individuals paid a percentage to Mr. Porisky to learn and to disperse the Paradigm theory.

[16] The scheme is difficult to describe. As noted in the case authorities dealing with Paradigm, it lacks common sense and is nonsensical. Mr. Porisky and the Paradigm theory have been analyzed in many cases in respect of the conviction and sentencing of Mr. Porisky's acolytes. There have been seven educators and 17 students convicted and sentenced. There are nine pending matters before this court, the B.C. Provincial Court, and other courts across the country.

[17] Trying to describe the Paradigm theory in a logical manner is impossible and inadvertently lends credence to it. Generally, Mr. Porisky and his Paradigm theory was based on the concept that, as natural persons as opposed to artificial persons, no tax on income was payable. As a natural person, Mr. Porisky, Ms. Gould, his educators and students could arrange their affairs by using contracts for hire, confidentiality clauses, amendments to the signature box on tax returns, disclaimers, and withdrawing from government benefit plans by using forms that Mr. Porisky and Paradigm prepared and provided to them.

[18] These unusual and irregular procedures were aimed at evading liability for the payment of taxes and GST. The materials were used to enable others to structure their affairs as a “natural person working in his or her own capacity under private contract for his or her own benefit”. Mr. Porisky and Paradigm, through Mr. Porisky's tortured logic, taught that the money earned under this arrangement was exempt from income tax and no GST was payable on it.

[19] The Paradigm theory taught individuals that this nonsensical interpretation of the law would frustrate the ability of the Crown to prove the requisite mens rea to secure a conviction for evasion of income taxes or counseling fraud. The theory of Mr. Porisky and Paradigm was that the Crown could not prove intent, or mens rea, if one had an honest belief in the law.

http://canlii.ca/t/gttrn

Judge said that Paradigm scheme was to produce an elaborate complex paper trail to show legitimacy. She said that the point of it all was to frustrate the ability of the Crown to prove mens rea.

Then on to Lawson's circumstances. He is 46 years old. No previous record. He has a grade 12 education (high school) and no post secondary education. He has been married since 1989 (I think, judge may have said 1999). He has two sons and is a stay at home father. His wife provides the family's only income. Lawson provides child care for his children and others. He has been unemployed since starting Paradigm teaching in 2001. He has letters of support from his wife, his father, and some friends. He has had health problems since 2013. Reconstructive surgery on his urethra in 2013. He has had numerous emergency visits and hospital stays. He self-catheterizes to keep his urethra open. He fights recurring infections to try and avoid sepsis. He was hospitalized in 2016. He has no assets, car or home (he lives in a rented apartment as does Millar).

Crown referred court to 25 prior Paradigm prosecutions across Canada. Reviewed the sentences the educators received starting with Blerot who got three years seven months. Blerot is reviewed here;

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=9275&p=182967

Judge Discussed Kovaluk and Williams, a married couple. They can be found here;

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=8968

As an aside Kovaluk, like Eva Sydel, was a successful dentist. As was Leo Fung (trial in progress);

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=10477&p=184836#p184836

and Peter Balogh (convicted, not yet sentenced);

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=11111

and Clarke Webster;

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=9055#p151999

The Poriskyites seem disproportionately represented by dentists.

Back to Justice Watchuk, Gerald Baudais got a light sentence of six months because he had a very sick wife. Sigglekow got 15 months;

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=9894

Seven other educators got 14 months to two years. Those who pled guilty got conditional sentences. Judge did not review student cases. Educators more instructive.

On to aggravating and mitigating circumstances - Crown argued that multiple tax years and OPCA tactics aggravating. Lawson essential part of a large organization set up to promote fraud on the government. He continued even though he knew his students were being convicted. He was recalcitrant all through his defense including arguments unknown to law. (I haven't noted if those were the judge's comment or her repetition of Crown's argument. I think it was judges analysis. We'll find out when decision released).

Some neutral and mitigating. No prior history. Conviction after trial neutral. Family and health mitigating but his financial insecurity is his own doing. The judge discussed Lawson's professed remorse. He said that he was remorseful. His words were articulate and carefully chosen. "I conclude that his remorse was equivocal and was predicated on a 'if' basis. If he was convicted he was wrong. He did not say that genuinely sorry. It is not apparent to the Court that Mr. Lawson's beliefs have changed at all". The judge said that his remorse was not sincere and had an insignificant impact on his sentence. I was of the same opinion watching him give his song and dance about remorse. It seemed to be forced out of him. He had a lawyer who told him he had to profess remorse to mitigate and keep out of jail so he did. Although he cried while doing it they weren't tears of remorse, it was self-pity. As I wrote;

I apologize if I deprived the government of taxes I legitimately owed. I accept my mistake. "My family thing." He started crying and breaking down so I couldn't understand him. Something about liver failure in May 2013. Trauma. Crying again. No protection from germs attacking me. He was concerned about going to jail over this. I didn't feel that my health was relevant for trial proceedings this year. The bench warrant was issued because he could not attend a court hearing because he was in emergency and he couldn't contact the court. If I had no children but it was just me I wouldn't be so concerned about this. A jail sentence poses a large risk to my life; kidney failure, blocked passage. The jail doesn't have the facilities to do the procedure. I spoke to lawyers who supported my beliefs. The standard was one of reasonableness and three lawyers and two accountants couldn't say that I was wrong so I thought that if I was audited I had a reasonable position I'm sorry I made that mistake and won't do it again.

Notice the 'if in that first sentence? Obviously Madame Justice Watchuk noticed. A few sentences about a purported apology then on about his health.

Judge said that Lawson claimed that it was only in 2008 that the cases showed him that he was wrong. Judge wasn't buying it. "I find on the evidence that Mr. Lawson had actual knowledge of the illegality of the Paradigm theory." "I note Mr. Millar's evidence on cross that the court in Sydel in 2006 rejected reasons. (note - that is what I scrawled down but it doesn't make sense. I think judge probably said that when Sydel came out in 2006 Lawson rejected its reasons). "Despite the reasons of Sydel Paradigm denied any evidence that conflicted with the Paradigm theory." Judge read out a few paragraph from Russell Porisky's analysis of the Sydel decision that he claimed showed that the decision was all wrong. I didn't copy them down but it will be in the released decision. This is the document the judge was referring to;

http://www.mediafire.com/file/4968k522c ... cision.pdf

Perhaps Madame Justice Watchuk was less than impressed by the last few paragraphs and their comments on the judiciary;

So perhaps the theory, that judge Meyers intentionally made errors in fact, and in law, so that this case could be easily appealed, and the actus rea component could be heard in a higher court, has some merit.

After all, when you consider it has been over 3 years since the originating charges were laid to the release of the Reasons for Judgment, by keeping this issue trudging through the different levels of higher court they could possibly buy another 3 or 5 years of additional sleep for the masses, not to mention the billions for the international banking cartel that now controls our government.

. . . . .

As only time will tell whether those in our country's judiciary are totally corrupted puppets of those international bankers who have economically enslaved the citizens of this country, as some adamantly suggest, or, as others would like to believe, whether those who hold these positions of honour are merely waiting for enough good people to wake up and shed their blankets of fear, so this country can go through a desperately needed peaceful reformation, rather than an (sic) detrimental, and perhaps violent, revolution.

Well it's ten years since the Sydel decision came out so I'd say the international banking cartel is doing a damn good job.

Another document available to Paradigm that the judge said that Millar ignored was a 2002 myth-buster release from the CRA that said that the natural man and voluntary tax theories were wrong.

Judge noted that Lawson's actual involvement in Paradigm was 2001 to2010. He only wound down his involvement in 2009. He worked directly with Porisky. "I do not accept his submission that he was involved only in the early years and stopped when it was shown that Paradigm was wrong." Judge said that while he claimed that everything he did was public and not concealed this did not make him any less culpable. Carl Gustafson was brought up and his testimony about how Lawson concealed court losses from his students. Note - Carl was one of Lawson's students who lived in Ontario and owned an engineering firm. Carl pled guilty to tax evasion and avoided jail time and he came to Vancouver to testify for the Crown at Lawson's trial. Carl is written up here;

viewtopic.php?f=50&t=9631

Paradigm did use unusual procedures in order to show lack of mens rea on the part of students. The most grave effect is, rather than just teaching fraud, Paradigm attacked the trust between taxpayers and the government. It promoted disorder and revolt against the law ands rules in Canada. The judge said that, apart from Lawson's fraud, the fraud of his students must also be considered. Four of Lawson's students have been convicted. Three in Norel Group, Carl Gustafson's engineering firm.

The issue is the length of a jail sentence and incarceration or a conditional sentence is appropriate. Judge said that she could do either. "I am satisfied that a conditional sentence would not endanger the community. However deterrence is an issue. Judge read out the principles of conditional sentencing as an alternative to incarceration. Judge actually did a fairly extensive review of the caselaw in this area and a review of cases more or less equivalent to Lawson to give the findings of other courts in similar circumstances. That was very much one of the things that I was happy not to try and scrabble to keep up with since it will all be logically laid out and assessed in the decision. Judge said that some Paradigm educators had received conditional sentences but they were in situations where they pled guilty (avoiding the expense of a trial) and there were joint submissions (agreement between defense and prosecution on an appropriate sentence).

We were running out of time. The courtroom was reserved from 10AM to 11:15 and another case was scheduled to start immediately after us. It was already 11:05 and lawyers and spectators for the next case were already trickling in. Judge did a review of Lawson's health problems. I won't go into it again. Judge said that while he had two doctor's letters they did not say that he could not receive appropriate medical care in jail. Judge cited a bunch of cases regarding incarceration and health. Judge said that Lawson had cited his lack of a record and his child care obligations as mitigating factors. "The children will suffer." Courts have found this irrelevant to sentencing. Cited two cases supporting this. Lawson had also submitted that his circumstances are unique to the present case and he shouldn't be compared to other offenders.

Judge said that the Crown had claimed that it was difficult to see how a conditional sentence would reflect deterrence and denunciation since Lawson essentially already lives equivalent to house arrest since he stays at home anyhow. The only educators who were given conditional sentences were the ones who pled guilty and had a joint submission.

Then, after an hour and a quarter of keeping Lawson in suspense, Justice Watchuk dropped the hammer. "I agree with the Crown that Lawson's conduct shows mistrust and conflict with authority. Jail is a necessary part and a fit sentence for charges 2 and 4. More importantly the counseling offense requires incarceration. I am mindful of the philosophy of rehabilitation. As a result of caselaw of other educators his culpability and actions make incarceration a fit sentence. The Taxpayer funded medical system will take care of him when incarcerated."

The judge gave Lawson six months each on the tax evasion and GST evasion charges to be served concurrently. She gave him twelve months on the counseling charge to be served consecutive to the evasion sentence for a total of eighteen months. She said she'd done this since the evasion conviction was not connected to the counseling conviction. They are separate offenses. He could have evaded tax without counseling or counseled evasion without evading tax himself. She imposed a 100% fine on income tax and GST evaded. Crown had requested that a DNA sample be taken. Agreed.

It was brought up that the judge had not set a schedule for the fine payment. Judge said the fie could wait until Lawson had served his time then a separate hearing would be held to determine a schedule. Judge told Lawson he could apply in the Court of Appeal for bail and parole while he appealed. Then, like his mentor, leader, and hero, Russell Porisky, Lawson was cuffed and taken into custody fulfilling the prophecy he made in December 2014.

Millar is the last Poriskyite educator I'm following. He'd better make plans for spending a significant time behind bars.

[The Observer]

Millar is the last Poriskyite educator I'm following. He'd better make plans for spending a significant time behind bars.

Great write-up and hopefully an end to the Poriskyite Saga. But I note that there is some potential wiggle room in your quote above. Are there other Poriskyites out there who are still contending with the government or recruiting new adherents?

[notorial dissent]

A question I'd had myself, are the Poriskyites really down for the count or is there someone out there still peddling it? Are we going to see son of Porisky?

[Burnaby49]

Millar is the last Poriskyite educator I'm following. He'd better make plans for spending a significant time behind bars.

Great write-up and hopefully an end to the Poriskyite Saga. But I note that there is some potential wiggle room in your quote above. Are there other Poriskyites out there who are still contending with the government or recruiting new adherents?

I can guarantee that there are no remaining active Poriskyites. Russell Porisky kept full records of all students and educators on his home computer. When the CRA seized it they had enough information to go after everybody. As far as I know they did. Porisky's records revealed over 800 students and over 30 educators so the Crown has been busy.

While Lawson and Millar are true believers the vast majority were just people who thought they'd bought into a scheme to allow them to escape paying taxes. They didn't care about any deeper meaning to the underlying theory and probably the majority were very surprised to find themselves facing criminal charges. I think many were just ignorant of the risk they were taking. But now that following Paradigm is a guaranteed criminal conviction all that remains is damage control by those that are still going through the justice system.

What I meant by my comment was that there are, as you assumed, probably still numerous Poriskyites working through the system across Canada that I don't know about and who, in any case, are outside of the range of a Skytrain ticket. Keep in mind that while I've been overwhelmed with these guys I've only been actively involved in the ones within a ten mile radius of my living room.

As an example of one that I've been planning report to for a while but just haven't found the time, let me introduce you to William Mori, the Poriskyite gardener;

http://www.mediafire.com/file/bhy62h71q ... cision.pdf

Mori is a classic Poriskyite. He evaded taxes under the assumption, as our Crown counsels here in Vancouver have always argued, that the main reason people bought into the Paradigm bullshit was to give them a fallback defense if caught;

10 Mr. Milot submitted that, unlike the tax protesters cases and unlike the "jurisdiction" cases, Mr. Mori accepts and concedes that he is a taxpayer and subject to the ITA. But Mr. Milot submitted that Mori is a taxpayer who believes that he has two "capacities" (sic). Mori honestly believed that in one of those capacities, (as a "private person",) he could, by contract, create and receive "private" income that was income tax exempt income. He honestly believed that he did not need to report that income on his income tax returns because he believed those funds were not subject to income tax.

11 Mr. Milot contends that this is not a submission about the ambit of the jurisdiction of the ITA. Rather, he submits that Mori's honestly held beliefs, even if legally incorrect preclude any finding that Mori had the mens rea required for any of the charges because the Crown has failed to demonstrate that those beliefs were not truly and honestly held.

12 Mr. Milot stressed that passage in R. v. Klundert, [2004] O.J. No. 3515found at paragraph [57] where Doherty J.A. quotes with approval, indeed with added emphasis the following statement of law: "In the end, the issue is whether based on all the evidence, the Government has proved that the defendant was aware of the duty at issue, which cannot be true if the jury credits a good-faith misunderstanding and belief submission, whether or not the claimed belief or misunderstanding is objectively reasonable." Since the test for mens rea is subjective Mori, it is contended, could and did believe in good faith that he had spun his gold into non-taxable straw.

13 At one point in his direct examination Mori used the phrase "exempt income" and clarified that evidence in his cross-examination when he used the phrases "tax exempt income" which is "deemed to be zero." Mr. Milot submits that Mori's beliefs and actions demonstrate that he believed that he had developed and implemented a lawful and fully ITA compliant tax avoidance plan. Therefore he submits that Mori should be found not guilty on all counts.

An excellent, very thorough, but unfortunately unreported decision. All that's public about him is this failed Jarvis application;

R. v. Mori, 2015 ONCJ 810 (CanLII)
http://canlii.ca/t/gs51v

but I've just been too swamped to get around to him. I have $50 of photocopies from the Federal Court of Canada sitting by my computer relating the latest antics of Charles Norman Holmes. It's sitting on top of a pile of copies covering some other fool. I have almost an endless list of idiots to address if I get around to it.