The Bizarre Case of "Admiral Mark Norman"
- Thread starter Ron in Regina
- Start date
OH HOID!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Your hypocrisy becomes more LOATHSOME by the day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
the Admiral Norman TRIAL is a HUGE WASTE of tax payer money!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And it is a PUBLIC ABUSE of a Cdn military officer as well!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
All Our idiot Boy had to do was COME CLEAN AND PUBLICLY CANCEL the warship contracts arranged by Harper and then walk away!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
But Our idiot Boy did not wish to make clear his CONTEMPT for Cdn sovereignty and national security and other issues of concern to many Cdns and to our Yankee allies as well!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
So he had to HIDE how he was going to make sure the Cdn Navy RUSTED OUT due to ENDLESS LIE-beral NEGLECT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If Our idiot Boy had been honest about disarming Cdn military then he would have been hit even harder over the head by Trump over national security issues during the NAFTA talks!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
So Our idiot Boy got SNEAKY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
In the usual LIE-beral back room deal sort of way!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
AND got caught!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
In the usual slimy LIE-beral way!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The nicest thing we can say about the Norman trial is that it may help people forget about Lavalin for a while!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
What a bunch of LIE-beral Maroons!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
There is indeed a go fund me campaign for the Vice-Admiral, Dixie and so far $399,677 has been raised for his defense.
And while the government has refused to provide funds for Mark Norman's defense - it will cover ex-MP Leslie's, strangely enough.
OTTAWA -- On Monday, the federal Conservatives seized on the news that former star candidate and now outgoing Liberal MP Andrew Leslie is on the witness list to testify, if called, against the government on behalf of suspended Vice-Admiral Mark Norman.
In the first question period since CTV News first reported that Leslie was willing to testify in the high-profile case about the alleged leak of cabinet documents, the Official Opposition questioned the Liberals about Leslie's offer to testify for the defence, and why Leslie's legal costs are being covered by the government, while Norman's are not.
www.ctvnews.ca/politics/tories-pounce-on-liberal-mp-s-intent-to-testify-at-norman-trial-1.4410534
www.gofundme.com/51lc5d4
I'll consider my tax dollars well spent once it is proven that Vice-Admiral Norman was unjustly accused and is cleared of all charges due to government - read LIBERAL interference in a DND contract.
More like liberal abuse of an outstanding, well-respected officer. From what I am reading the public, for the most part, is firmly on the side of the Vice-Admiral.
Agreed. We need to take decision making out of the hands of elected politicians and put it back in the hands of bureaucrats where it belongs
Here's a good Macleans article on the subject ... with a happy ending in the last paragraph.
http://www.macleans.ca/politics/ottawa/the-roots-of-the-mark-norman-trial/
http://www.macleans.ca/politics/ottawa/the-roots-of-the-mark-norman-trial/
Perhaps I worded that wrong. I was speaking of Scott Brison and Justin Trudeau.
Leslie is going to testify for Norman. My opinion of the man is that he is an opportunistic a-hole, but I'm not sitting in judgment of his testifying. Perhaps he developed a conscience?
Thank you Mowich!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
YOU MAKE my point for me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The Norman trial IS a huge waste of money!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
By a SLEAZY govt that wants to implement policy that IT KNOWS most Cdns do NOT approve of!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And the Norman trial was supposed to fly under the radar and silence a whistle blower!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Before the public noticed or became informed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
To bad for LIE-berals..........................................
Norman would not roll over and play dead like a good little LIE-beral military DOG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
As I have said before.............................................
there is ample evidence to indicate that all LIE-berals DESPISE the Cdn military!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
And that Our idiot Boy Justin is continuing his father`s plan to unilaterally disarm Canada and surrender completely to Socialist and Communist domination!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Our idiot Boy is a closet Communist!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Just like his NASTY father Pierre!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
They both LOVE the Beijing Butchers!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Great background on the story, CC. This is also a good read.
www.macleans.ca/opinion/the-liberals-need-to-rip-off-the-norman-band-aid/
That supply ship in the photo is HMCS Protecteur. I was on her when she was shiny and new back during the first half of the 1970's.
Gettin' old, man ...
CHRISTIE BLATCHFORD: Crown expected to withdraw breach of trust charge against Mark Norman
Christie Blatchford, Postmedia News
Published: 23 minutes ago Updated: 16 minutes ago
www.thechronicleherald.ca/opinion/columnists/christie-blatchford-crown-expected-to-withdraw-breach-of-trust-charge-against-mark-norman-309134/
Christie Blatchford, Postmedia News
Published: 23 minutes ago Updated: 16 minutes ago
www.thechronicleherald.ca/opinion/columnists/christie-blatchford-crown-expected-to-withdraw-breach-of-trust-charge-against-mark-norman-309134/
Admiral Norman might just end up suing their asses sixty ways to Sunday. They have certainly besmirched his name and destroyed his career. The Liberals REALLY HATE the military.
CHRISTIE BLATCHFORD: Crown expected to withdraw breach of trust charge against Mark Norman
Christie Blatchford, Postmedia News
Published: 23 minutes ago Updated: 16 minutes ago
The federal government is expected to pull the plug on its prosecution of Vice-Admiral Mark Norman for alleged breach of trust, the National Post has learned.
The case is back in court on Wednesday for what was to have been a brief scheduled update on the progress of the government’s efforts at disclosing documents to Norman’s defence team.
Ontario Court Judge Heather Perkins-McVey has been riding herd on federal prosecutors and Department of Justice officials for months now.
The tip-off was an unusual alert from the Public Prosecution Service of Canada sent late Tuesday to reporters who have been following the case.
“The Public Prosecution of Canada would like to advise you that there is a scheduled appearance May 8, 2019 at 10:00 am in courtroom # 11 in the Mark Norman prosecution. You may wish to attend,” said the prosecution’s media advisory released at 6:52 p.m. ET.
It is unclear why exactly the government appears ready to end the case.
Norman, who is charged with a single count of breach of trust for allegedly leaking cabinet secrets about the government’s $700-million shipbuilding deal, was the No. 2 in the Canadian Forces until his temporary suspension in January of 2017.
He wasn’t charged by the RCMP until March of 2018.
His lawyers, Marie Henein and Christine Mainville, have always maintained that, as they put it in a third-party records application last fall, “Vice-Admiral Norman is not the right person standing trial.”
The charge alleges that Norman leaked the secret information to a former CBC journalist and a Quebec shipbuilding firm.
That firm, Chantier Davie, had been selected by the former Stephen Harper government to provide a badly needed supply ship – basically a floating gas station – in a sole-source contract in the fall of 2015.
The Harper Conservatives lost that election, and in November, one of the new Trudeau government’s first acts of business was to discuss that contract — with former Treasury Board president Scott Brison arriving at an ad hoc cabinet meeting with a letter of complaint from Davie competitor Irving asking that the new government take a second look at the deal.
The committee decided to request a 60-day delay before signing off on the Davie deal — that’s the information Norman is accused of leaking to the reporter and to Davie.
The decision, and the $89-million penalty taxpayers would incur if the deal was cancelled, made headlines across the country.
The new government was embarrassed into signing off on the deal, but immediately the Privy Council Office launched an internal probe into the leaks, which it referred to the RCMP.
(The ship itself was a stunning success in the world of military procurement — delivered on time and on budget.)
The problem for prosecutors is that as early as last fall, the government had identified at least six leaks linked to the ad hoc meeting alone.
In fact, only this March, RCMP charged Matthew Matchett, a public servant, with breach of trust in connection with the same alleged leak.
As Norman’s lawyers said in court documents, “The prosecution, like procurement, is immersed in politics. It pits Liberals against Conservatives, with an apolitical Vice- Admiral as its casualty.”
Henein and Mainville have made ferocious arguments in court that the government was dragging its feet even in disclosing basic documents to them.
As well, they were poised to bring an abuse of process motion later this month or early in June. That motion was expected to level allegations of political interference and obstruction of subpoena requests for documents as reasons for the case to be dismissed before it gets to trial.
The trial was set for early August.
Liberal MP and former army commander Andrew Leslie offered to be a witness for Norman at his trial, according to a CTV News report last week.
Citing sources, the broadcaster reported that Leslie informed the Prime Minister’s Office more than a year ago that he would testify on behalf of Norman. It was unclear in what capacity he would take the stand.
The case has been rife with suspicions of political interference.
Henein has argued the government has lagged on providing records the defence requires to make its case. In March she said she had not seen “a single document,” she said, after her request in October for communications between the Privy Council Office and Prime Minister’s Office on the topic of Norman, and notes relied upon during witness interviews in the RCMP investigation of Norman.
Some of the documentation that was offered was “completely and utterly useless,” she said, detailing PCO lawyer Paul Shuttle’s submission of an inch-thick pile of records that are already public, such as the government’s access-to-information manual. “How is that possibly responsive to the request?” Perkins-McVey quipped.
Among the documents the defence was seeking was a 60-page memo from then Privy Council Clerk Michael Wernick to Trudeau that had been entirely blacked out.
www.thechronicleherald.ca/opinion/columnists/christie-blatchford-crown-expected-to-withdraw-breach-of-trust-charge-against-mark-norman-309134/
Christie Blatchford, Postmedia News
Published: 23 minutes ago Updated: 16 minutes ago
The federal government is expected to pull the plug on its prosecution of Vice-Admiral Mark Norman for alleged breach of trust, the National Post has learned.
The case is back in court on Wednesday for what was to have been a brief scheduled update on the progress of the government’s efforts at disclosing documents to Norman’s defence team.
Ontario Court Judge Heather Perkins-McVey has been riding herd on federal prosecutors and Department of Justice officials for months now.
The tip-off was an unusual alert from the Public Prosecution Service of Canada sent late Tuesday to reporters who have been following the case.
“The Public Prosecution of Canada would like to advise you that there is a scheduled appearance May 8, 2019 at 10:00 am in courtroom # 11 in the Mark Norman prosecution. You may wish to attend,” said the prosecution’s media advisory released at 6:52 p.m. ET.
It is unclear why exactly the government appears ready to end the case.
Norman, who is charged with a single count of breach of trust for allegedly leaking cabinet secrets about the government’s $700-million shipbuilding deal, was the No. 2 in the Canadian Forces until his temporary suspension in January of 2017.
He wasn’t charged by the RCMP until March of 2018.
His lawyers, Marie Henein and Christine Mainville, have always maintained that, as they put it in a third-party records application last fall, “Vice-Admiral Norman is not the right person standing trial.”
The charge alleges that Norman leaked the secret information to a former CBC journalist and a Quebec shipbuilding firm.
That firm, Chantier Davie, had been selected by the former Stephen Harper government to provide a badly needed supply ship – basically a floating gas station – in a sole-source contract in the fall of 2015.
The Harper Conservatives lost that election, and in November, one of the new Trudeau government’s first acts of business was to discuss that contract — with former Treasury Board president Scott Brison arriving at an ad hoc cabinet meeting with a letter of complaint from Davie competitor Irving asking that the new government take a second look at the deal.
The committee decided to request a 60-day delay before signing off on the Davie deal — that’s the information Norman is accused of leaking to the reporter and to Davie.
The decision, and the $89-million penalty taxpayers would incur if the deal was cancelled, made headlines across the country.
The new government was embarrassed into signing off on the deal, but immediately the Privy Council Office launched an internal probe into the leaks, which it referred to the RCMP.
(The ship itself was a stunning success in the world of military procurement — delivered on time and on budget.)
The problem for prosecutors is that as early as last fall, the government had identified at least six leaks linked to the ad hoc meeting alone.
In fact, only this March, RCMP charged Matthew Matchett, a public servant, with breach of trust in connection with the same alleged leak.
As Norman’s lawyers said in court documents, “The prosecution, like procurement, is immersed in politics. It pits Liberals against Conservatives, with an apolitical Vice- Admiral as its casualty.”
Henein and Mainville have made ferocious arguments in court that the government was dragging its feet even in disclosing basic documents to them.
As well, they were poised to bring an abuse of process motion later this month or early in June. That motion was expected to level allegations of political interference and obstruction of subpoena requests for documents as reasons for the case to be dismissed before it gets to trial.
The trial was set for early August.
Liberal MP and former army commander Andrew Leslie offered to be a witness for Norman at his trial, according to a CTV News report last week.
Citing sources, the broadcaster reported that Leslie informed the Prime Minister’s Office more than a year ago that he would testify on behalf of Norman. It was unclear in what capacity he would take the stand.
The case has been rife with suspicions of political interference.
Henein has argued the government has lagged on providing records the defence requires to make its case. In March she said she had not seen “a single document,” she said, after her request in October for communications between the Privy Council Office and Prime Minister’s Office on the topic of Norman, and notes relied upon during witness interviews in the RCMP investigation of Norman.
Some of the documentation that was offered was “completely and utterly useless,” she said, detailing PCO lawyer Paul Shuttle’s submission of an inch-thick pile of records that are already public, such as the government’s access-to-information manual. “How is that possibly responsive to the request?” Perkins-McVey quipped.
Among the documents the defence was seeking was a 60-page memo from then Privy Council Clerk Michael Wernick to Trudeau that had been entirely blacked out.
www.thechronicleherald.ca/opinion/columnists/christie-blatchford-crown-expected-to-withdraw-breach-of-trust-charge-against-mark-norman-309134/
In a nutshell, almost as soon as the liberals were in power they decided that one of their largest party donors - Irving Shipyards - should get the contract and when some as yet unknown person snitched on their decision to delay the Davie contract all hell broke lose. The liberals were forced to go ahead with the Davie contract - and thank the powers that be that they did - or face even further scorn due to the loss of $89 million taxpayers dollars.
In a fit of pique because they couldn't reward their buddies with a cushy contract, the liberals ordered the Privy Council to look into the leak. Michael Wernicke - oh he of Justice Committee fame - fingered Vice-Admiral Mark Norman - for reasons we may now never know. Considering that six other leaks were identified by the government itself, it boggles the mind that they would pick Mark Norman to be their scapegoat. And that would be their downfall.
If indeed the government is backing off, I am really happy for Mark Norman but part of me wishes that it had gone to trial as there are still many important questions that have yet to be answered. The main one being - why Vice-Admiral Norman?
I so wanted to see him and Wernick - who Marie also wanted to call to the stand - squirming and stuttering in the witness box as they tried to worm their way out of this egregious miscarriage of justice, CC.
I'm wondering if Leslie was the straw that broke the liberals back? The timing is certainly suspect.
Denied the chance to hang the government out to dry, I am sure Marie will be suitably primed to take them to the cleaners on the Vice-Admiral's behalf.
Tomorrow will be interesting. Less than 12hrs until the announcement. I would LOVE for Mark Norman to have a "Tell All" book surrounding this whole abuse of power, naming names, and exposing the truly filthy and corrupt in this whole political cesspool. Doesn't look like we'll have the satisfaction of seeing the slimy and nefarious under oath testifying in a court of law. Sunny ways....