CPTnet
November 17, 2001
Esgenoopetitj Update: September 27-- October 24, 2001

Thursday, September 27
In the early morning, several Esgenoôpetitj First Nation (EFN) Rangers
reported to CPT that there was heavy Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP)
activity on the reserve. The police were stationed at the highway, and had
pulled over numerous people.

Friday, September 28
There were several verbal encounters between Mi'kmaq fishermen and
Department of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) officers on the bay. The fishers
attempted to get a clarification from the DFO on the exact location of the
boundary of the fishing zone dictated by the DFO but were treated with
contempt and threats of arrest for obstruction (see October 4 release,
"Drawing the Line.")

At 9:00 p.m. a community member called CPT to report that while fishing in
his small dory, he had been chased by a large non-Native commercial fishing
boat which eventually left him alone and returned to the Neguac wharf.

CPTer Doug Pritchard called the Neguac RCMP detachment to report the
incident, but was met with intense questioning of the native fisherman's
activities. "Are you taking this seriously, or just harassing me?"
Pritchard asked Constable MacAvoy. The officer called back 15 minutes
later to report that the RCMP had intercepted an incoming boat at the
wharf, but the operator denied chasing anyone.

Monday, October 1
Janet Shoemaker and Barbara Martens attended the court in Miramichi for the
beginning of the trial of Leigh Morrison, a white fisherman from Burnt
Church charged with three counts of assault with a deadly weapon on six
young Aboriginal men. Angry that Morrison had been part of a large
demonstration in which all of the community's traps were destroyed by
non-Aboriginal fishers on October 3, 1999, the six men had gone to
Morrison's property seeking traps as compensation for their loss. Morrison
was charged with ramming their truck onto its side with his van, and then
beating two of the injured passengers over the head with a baseball bat.
Before jury selection began, there was a hearing to decide whether
additional questions aimed at weeding out racist jurors could be allowed in
the selection process. The judge ruled in favour of the questions. The
jury finally selected was all white.

Tuesday, October 2
The team received a call from the RCMP that the DFO did have a fishing
vessel on radar the previous Friday night at the time that the EFN fisher
reported being chased. The officer said there was no second vessel spotted
on their radar.

Thursday, October 4
Shoemaker went to the Morrison trial and listened as four of the young men
who had been injured in the incident gave their testimony. The driver of
the truck told how, while his head was caught between the ground and the
frame of the truck, he saw Morrison come at him with the bat and felt it
come down on his head. The prosecutor allowed them to give their accounts
of what they remembered, but then focussed in on the quantities of drugs
and alcohol each had consumed in the 24 hours beforehand. He then proceeded
to read to the court each man's record of offenses since they were
teenagers.

Sunday, October 7
The team attended a community potluck at the school with a visiting guest
elder as speaker. There was storytelling on Mi'kmaq history and language,
and a talking circle after the meal.

Tuesday, October 9
Shoemaker and Lena Siegers went to Miramichi to attend several court
sessions. Siegers watched a video of Morrison's statement to the RCMP in
which he admitted ramming the EFN members' truck with his van, but would
not answer whether he had hit the two men on the head with a baseball bat.

Shoemaker attended the trial of EFN fisher, John Dana Ward, who was charged
with assault for spitting on a DFO officer's face shield. DFO officers
had pepper-sprayed and clubbed him, and then pulled him on to their boats
on August 29, 2000, after Ward's boat had been swamped and run over by DFO
boats. Video footage of this incident taken by a friend of EFN and by CPT
was shown around the world. The three DFO officers testifying against Ward
denied any knowledge of the ramming or the video footage. As the judge
withdrew to consider his verdict, an RCMP officer reminded the prosecutor
of the existence of the videotape. The prosecutor informed the judge who
then withheld his verdict so Ward could enter this additional evidence.

Another EFN fisher, Leo Bartibogue, pled guilty to an obstruction charge in
exchange for dropping an assault charge against him allegedly for touching
a DFO officer in July 2000. Bartibogue was fined $1000 or community service
and oneyear's probation.

Wednesday, October 10
CPTer's on watch noticed a buildup of DFO and RCMP activity on the bay and
the edges of the reserve in the afternoon. In the early evening, DFO boats
attacked an EFN fisher and confiscated his boat, the last of the larger,
noncommercial boats in the community (see CPTnet release, "DFO stages
another assault"). EFN members who gathered at the Neguac wharf expressed
much anger at the DFO officers staging such an attack so near the end of a
relatively quiet fishing season.

Thursday, October 11
The newspapers announced the acquittal of Leigh Morrison on all three
counts of assault against EFN members.

Saturday, October 20
Most of the EFN fishers removed their traps from the water for the end of
the fishing season.

Sunday, October 21
The DFO appeared at sun-up to remove all traps remaining in the bay.

Wednesday, October 24
The team closed up camp for the year and prepared to leave.