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Mister Justice, the Kahnistensera made a submission regarding that motion on Case Management, as follows:
MNN. Dec. 1, 2023. “Shekon Judge. I unfortunately have to remind you of a very grave matter about the Defendants TOTAL DISRESPECT for the law. There have been some exchanges between the Special Interlocutor, the Defendants and us since the latest Court Order that you issued.. Mr. Justice, on November 20th 2023, these exchanges are EXTREMELY concerning. One comes to wonder whether the Defendants consider themselves to be bound by the law as everyone else is in Canadian society. We wrote to the SQI and McGill immediately after we received your judgment, proposing that we write a joint message to the Expert Panel to share the Judgment and prepare updated information on the archaeological interventions that took place on the site since the Panel was wrongfully disbanded.
The Defendants responded on November 23rd 2023, that they were “currently studying Judge Moore’s latest decision”, and that “excavation work can continue without interruption”. The language is similar to the email McGill sent to all its students and faculty on November 21st 2023, where they said, “We will study the decision and its implications more fully in the days to come. In the meantime, as per the court’s decision, the work at the site may continue”. The main decision within the Judgment to reinstate the Panel was not mentioned.
Ten days after your Judgment was rendered, we still haven’t heard back from the Defendants. I don’t know how much time it will take them to study the 12-page Judgment you issued, Mister Justice. It took us a couple of hours, without any lawyers to help us. It might take them a few months, or a few years, after the New Vic Project is completed, to actually read the Judgment and contemplate ways to implement it! They seem to have all the time they needed to plan and execute excavation work on the site, which continued ceaselessly.
The patch in front of the Hersey Pavilion McGill where the dogs detected the scent of human remains has now become a huge hole. Ethnoscop produced a report regarding the investigation of the dog alert. They say they didn’t find a burial. More precisely, they say that they sifted 150 bone fragments most of which are too small to determine whether they’re animal or human, and ended up suggesting that they must be animal because of the “archaeological context”, not even explaining what the context was. As far as we know, the context is that search dogs smelled human remains there.
We recall the Defendants had decided to move the piles of soil excavated where the dogs smelled human remains to another location so they could start their project there. We opposed this because we feared that it would damage any bones contained in that soil.
So the piles were moved elsewhere against our consent. They were sifted using a huge machine normally used for mining. After being moved around and sifted in a huge machine, all that was left of the bones were fragments that are impossible to identify. This report was written on November 22nd, 2023 two days after the Court Ruling that reinstated the Expert Panel. But the Defendants were too busy to implement it. They just let everything continue in the meantime.
On November 21st, the counsel for the Special Interlocutor shared a letter with all parties suggesting to “work together to enable the Expert Panel to resume its work” by setting a meeting “to outline draft contracts for the Expert Panel” and to discuss whether to replace Justine Bourgignon-Tetrault or to continue with a two-person panel, in accordance with your suggestion, Mister Justice. What did the Defendants do? They never responded. Were they too busy rereading the Judgment? Your Judgment was clear, Mr. Justice, in stating that continuing the work without the oversight of the Expert Panel creates irreparable harm. It’s written in black and white.
So it’s obvious that if anyone receives a Court Order to have supervision of your excavation work by a Panel of Experts, your priority is to respect that Court Order and reach out to the Panel.
It’s now been 11 days since the Court Order was issued, and nothing was done to implement it. That’s in addition to the month that passed since the hearing on October 27, 2023, which was in addition to the almost two months that passed since the Expert Panel was unilateraly fired by the Defendants, transforming this investigation into a blatant insult to our intelligence. The Defendants proved these last 11 days, including the three months before, that they have no intention whatsoever of respecting our concerns and even respecting the law.
They now want to get rid of the Special Interlocutor to leave us without any oversight from any qualified person committed to the sacred work of protecting unmarked burials. The Special Interlocutor and her attorneys played an essential role in allowing the settlement agreement to happen and to bring some sort of agreement and legibility to this mess.
We’re sorry that it comes to that point, but we have no choice but to ask this court to act upon its own rulings and to compel the defendants to respect its decisions. The Court Order issued on November 20th clearly acknowledged the irreparable harm caused by the Defendants’ refusal to abide by the recommendations of the Expert Panel. Eleven days after the Court Ruling was issued we’re still at the same point. The Panel hasn’t even been told that it’s been reinstated because the Defendants keep postponing the very first step which is to announce the Court Ruling to them. It appears their bad faith is such that they won’t do anything cooperative if it’s not directly ordered in black and white.
If the Judgment doesn’t say that the Panel has to be contacted by the specific date, they’ll just never tell them that they’re reinstated! And during that time, we are being hurt and hurt and hurt every single day the excavation moves forward.
Here’s a story. We’re in the desert and we have a gallon of water for two people, and the court orders that we should share the water. But I actually have the water bottle, and when I learn about the court order I start saying that I have to read and re-read it and think about it. But, in the meantime I actually end up drinking the whole gallon of water. What would that mean? To me it’s crystal clear. It means that the law is breached. That’s all there is to it.
That’s all I have to say”. Kahentinetha of the Kahnistensera Mohawk Mothers.
Ted Nugent, the Motor City Madman, exclaims: “Sabotage on the downtown streets. Police cars overturned. Can’t do nothing to beat the heat. And if you don’t, you’ll get burned. Sleek women behind every door. Cost more money than you got. You best be up if you want some more cause if you don’t, you’ll be shot. Dog, dog eat dog. [4 times].
Kamikaze from the 100th floor, swan dive to the street. He couldn’t handle this mad house no more. He craved that sweeter meat. Yeah, dog, dog, dog eat dog…..”
thahoketoteh@ntk.com MNN Court Correspondent