A federal agency relied on a news release from a volunteer press group in assessing risks of violence at the Freedom Convoy, according to records. Evidence shown at a judicial inquiry and parliamentary hearings contradict claims the protest was armed and dangerous..“The Canadian Association of Journalists stated they were ‘concerned about threats of violence and harassment’ of reporters covering the truckers’ convoy,” said an internal memo by the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre. “Journalists have been verbally harassed on camera, chased and sent racist death threats.”.“At least one news vehicle was damaged,” said the memo Terrorist Financing Risks Of Freedom Convoy. “In particular, journalists received death threats, were spat on and were physically and verbally harassed by the protesters.”.According to Blacklock's Reporter, all the claims were drawn from a Jan. 28 news released by the Canadian Association of Journalists, a volunteer group based in Toronto. All the Association’s allegations were second and third hand..The “death threat" was a Jan. 27 message from an unidentified Toronto resident who texted a local CBC reporter: “Traitors will swing in time.” The “spat on” reference came from a Jan. 27 tweet by a Canadian Press photographer in Toronto reading: “So nice to spend my birthday getting spat on, shoved and yelled at by supporters of the anti-vax truck convoy.”.Both allegations predated the Jan. 28 arrival of the Freedom Convoy outside Parliament Hill. No protester was ever charged with assaulting or uttering threats against a reporter..“We’ve seen this already from several videos on Twitter,” Brent Jolly, the president of the Association of Journalists, said in Feb. 7 remarks to the weekly Hill Times. Jolly said he feared “something bad was going to happen.”.Police have confirmed in testimony at parliamentary hearings and the Public Order Emergency Commission that no firearms were ever found in protesters’ vehicles outside Parliament. “A weapon can be many things,” Patricia Ferguson, deputy Ottawa police chief, testified November 3. “A weapon can be a knife, it can be a tire iron.”.Catherine McKenney, a former Ottawa councillor who said she was “terrified” of protesters, acknowledged she never witnessed any actual violence. “I didn’t personally witness any acts of violence,” McKenney testified Oct. 14. “I was told about them.”.“I was terrified going into another weekend where the actions of harassment and intimidation were just increasing every weekend,” said McKenney. The councillor said she heard accounts of criminality “mostly through social media.”.Then-Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson testified Oct. 18 the protest “was lawlessness,” and a “horrific situation.” Asked for details of what he had witnessed, Watson replied: “I saw reports in the media.”
