Police enforce an injunction in February 2022 against protesters, including some who were camped in their trucks for weeks. (Evan Mitsui/CBC)
Under cross-examination, she said the truck didn’t make contact with her “only because I moved out of the way.”
She said she believed police filed a report but no further action was taken as a result of the incident.
Gridlock caused
Li also described convoy vehicles slowing down ambulances that had been responding to a call and roads that were “completely blocked off,” but she couldn’t remember specifics.
She also said she couldn’t take the bus because routes were relocated and the smell of gasoline from idling vehicles in the downtown core was “almost inescapable at times.”
At one point during her testimony, she was cautioned to stop using the word “occupation” because the trial is using “protest” or “demonstration” to describe the events of the convoy, while “occupation” has a different legal definition.
Barber’s lawyer Diane Magas objected to the continued use of the term saying the word was “irritating” and “inflammatory.” Justice Heather McVey-Perkins told court the language could impact the credibility of Li’s testimony.
Courthouse tensions
The latter portion of court Monday was highlighted by Greenspon asking Li about conversations she had after exiting the witness box.
Li said she spoke with her lawyer for “not more than five to ten minutes” in the courthouse before leaving, while Greenspon wanted to know whether she had spoken about her testimony with her legal counsel in her civil case, which would have violated directions of the court.
Li, who was seen exiting the courthouse in tears, said she was “upset” after leaving the courthouse.
“I was trying to calm myself and as a result of my reaction we decided that I would go home alone over lunch,” she said Monday in front of a crowd that was slightly larger than typical for the trial.
Li’s cross-examination by Greenspon and Magas continued with the two trying to poke holes in her credibility by comparing what she had told the court and what she said in her testimony at the Public Order Emergency Commission (POEC) one year ago.
The POEC differed from a criminal trial in several ways. For example, hearsay evidence was admissible, but that’s not the case in a criminal trial.
The lawyers focused on how she described the frequency of honking and her response to the protest, including her recollection of telling protesters to, “Go back to where the f–k you are from”, her “disappointment” with the police response and her knowledge of an incident wear eggs were thrown at the protesters from the building she was living in.
“I think that her testimony on the surface was genuine as to how she felt about things, but when you went beyond this to what she actually said under oath, there were numerous contradictions,” Greenspon said outside the courthouse. “So that’ll be something that the judge has to consider when looking at her credibility.”
Final resident testifies
Paul Jorgenson, who testified at the end of Monday as the likely final resident to be called as a witness, said during the protest he lived in a highrise building at the corner of Kent Street and Laurier Avenue West.
“It was incessant, it was extremely loud, it’s hard to convey in words how upsetting, how impossible it made basic life, basic higher-level thought,” said Jorgenson, adding it was untenable to conduct required work meetings.
He said he had to drive on the sidewalk in order to escape the protest.
After finally leaving his home for several days, he returned to the city and found the situation had become more “livable” with less honking and congestion despite occasional “flare-ups.”
Barber and Lich, who continue to attend the trial, sat with loved ones and supporters in the front row Monday.
The Crown is expected to call more police witnesses as the trial extends beyond the original expected length of 16 days.