FifthVille
Why are things so quiet?
Well, it turns out that the good Mr. Brian Bonney has taken one for the BCL team and pleaded guilty to something or other.
Keith Fraser of Postmedia has the story, such as it is.
Here is Mr. Fraser's lede:
A former Liberal government communications director quietly entered a guilty plea to one count of breach of trust on Thursday in the so-called quick wins scandal from the Christy Clark era.
Brian Bonney, who once worked on Clark’s Liberal leadership campaign, entered the plea to the criminal charge before provincial court Judge David St. Pierre in Vancouver...
So.
What was it that Mr. Bonney did that resulted in the charge that he is now copping to?
According to Mr. Fraser's story it really wasn't much. Something relatively innocuous that had something to with a by-election 'donation' that wasn't quite kosher back in 2012:
...Election Act charges arising from the same RCMP investigation were laid in 2014 against Bonney, co-accused Mark Robertson and a numbered company. Those charges related to allegations stemming from a byelection in 2012. The charges were dealt with in May 2016 after the numbered company entered a guilty plea to one count of making/accepting a political donation.
The company, which did business as Mainland Communications, was fined $5,000 and the remaining charges were stayed. Bonney was the president of the company.
But...
I seem to recall that there was all kinds of stuff that swirled around the capping-of all things 'Quick Winning' at the time that just might have come up again if Mr. Bonney had chosen to go through with a trial instead of copping.
Something about an Email that the good Mr. Bonney wrote about a potentially disgruntled staffer that they were worried might blow the whistle or something...
Hang on a second while I go into the archives and have a look....
Ahhh, yes, here it is....
..."Have [BC Liberal MLA] Harry Bloy meet with her and explain how doing anything would damage the Premier and the party. Have him say how he will try to find her work and get her back involved... If need be, offer x dollars per month to do non public work up to election [developing her database of potential supporters]."...
That 'her' in Mr. Boney's Email turned out to be a staffer who did the right thing and blew the whistle anyway.
Cassidy Olivier nailed that one down in The Province back in the day:
...Sepideh Sarrafpour, a former government liaison contractor and one-time honorary liaison to former multiculturalism minster Harry Bloy, confirmed to the Province that she was the person referenced in a government email the subject of heated debate this week.
“Yeah it is me,” Sarrafpour told The Province Tuesday. “They were talking about me.”...
Given all that, perhaps now is the time to get specific (rather than all innocuous 'n stuff as Mr. Fraser's story was above) about what, precisely the charges against Mr. Bonney and his company were:
Imagine that!
________
And one more thing (re: that lede from Mr. Fraser quoted above).... The good Mr. Bonney did much, much more than just 'work on (Christy) Clark's (BC) Liberal leadership campaign'....For example, in addition to being the very fine Mr. Bloy's Comms Director on our dime (again we're shocked!, shocked! I tell you, that the Dipper's have since hired their own folks to do similar things) he was also named in the Quick Wins origin document (a.k.a. 'The Spreadsheet').
To give credit where absolutely none is due....Mr. Fraser's is not the only proMedia report that is doing its part in the invocation of the silence of the forgetting of what was really and truly at the core of this thing....which, of course would be the 'offer her x dollars per month' bit to keep quiet in the original Email...
.
7 comments:
@RossK Do you think that the fine and upstanding BC Liberal Party, which paid the BC Treasury back for illegally billed hours that Mr. Bonney initially claimed was all Caucus work, now be looking to claw back the other half from Mr. Bonney, with his admission of guilt.
NVG--
In a word...
No.
.
Sour Grapes Trivia: MLA Harry Bloy nominated Brian Bonnie and Sepideh Sarrafpour to be recipients for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Medal.
docs.openinfo.gov.bc.ca/d2133414a_response_package_oop-2013-00300.pdf
Will the medal be clawed back from Brian Bonney?
Apparently not according to Warren Kinsella's Opinion February 9, 2013
... Out west, a Conservative MP gave medals to a couple of convicted criminals. Out of the 30 medals MP Maurice Vellacott received, one was received by an anti-abortion fanatic, Mary Wagner, who happened to be in jail at the time. Minister of Justice Rob Nicholson, who theoretically oversees the legal system that put Wagner in jail, was asked how such a thing could happen. Ask Vellacott, he said. No one seems to know much, or care.
In London, as the Free Press revealed, a former municipal politician who has been convicted of municipal corruption got a medal, as well. George Avola was honoured this week by Mayor Joe Fontana — who himself is awaiting trial on charges of fraud, uttering forged documents and breach of trust by a public official. How could such a thing happen? Again: No one knows. ....
http://vancouversun.com/news/politics/guilty-plea-in-quick-wins-scandal-wraps-up-long-running-case
Special prosecutor David Butcher, who was appointed in 2013 to look into allegations of partisan use of taxpayer resources to win votes in ethnic communities, said Friday the case is now mostly over.
“Subject to some other small odds and ends that need to be wrapped up, and there are a couple, the sentencing will be the last significant act,” Butcher said in an interview.
Odds and ends indeed. Where else have we heard Mr. Butchers name?
Inquisitive pro journalists might wonder if what appears to be standard practice for silencing a worker bee might also be standard practice for silencing those of higher status in the hive. And just what that practice might look like.
The pay scale for refraining from "doing anything that would damage the Premier and the party" seems to run from "x dollars per month to do non public work" up to release from liability for $6.4 million to plead guilty and then remain silent. Are there other instances along that scale, with varying amounts or methods of payment? Surely not in BC! Those are the only two, the pro journos seem to be saying; and even those not too loudly.
I also note with some interest, given the special prosecutor and surprise guilty plea situation, that the guy who signed the Basi/Virk plea deal with the defendants behind the special prosecutor's back during the BC Rail trial is now our Deputy Attorney General. Hopefully he was more courteous to the special prosecutor in this case.
the case is mostly over??? tampering with our democracy is never over nor should it be. If it is done once, it can be done a whole lot more often. A democracy is only as good as those who protect it. The MSM in this case did nothing to help democracy. As we used to say back in the day: if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.
In the U.S.A. it would appear that the Russia tampered with their democracy. In B.C. we do it ourselves. Its very very sick. thank goodness for bloggers who publish the truth along with those who read and contribute more information.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhINJ-5Wqqk
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