(LifeSiteNews) – Anti-COVID lockdown Canadian Christian pastor Artur Pawlowski is appealing two convictions against him for giving a sermon to truckers participating in a border blockade in early 2022.
The Democracy Fund (TDF) said in a press release that it has retained Sarah Miller of JSS Barristers to assist Pawlowski in appealing a conviction of counseling mischief as well as another for breaching a release condition, which mandated that he “keep the peace” and behave.
The TDF noted that a Notice of Criminal Appeal was filed in an Alberta court on Monday.
According to the TDF, Pawlowski’s appeal will focus on a “matter of law.”
“Specifically, he is claiming that the trial judge erred in her interpretation of the Criminal Code and that the Crown failed to prove that he did not attend Coutts for the purpose of communicating information, which can be a defence to the crime of mischief,” the TDF said.
In the court documents, Pawlowski states that “the Crown failed to prove that there was an absence of legal justification for his speech, namely freedom of expression as enshrined in the Charter of Rights and Freedom.”
On September 18, Court of King’s Bench of Alberta Justice Gordon Krinke convicted Pawlowski on counseling mischief and breaching release condition charges and gave him a 60-day jail sentence. However, because the pastor had already spent a total of 78 days in jail, he was let go.
Krinke at the time said that Pawlowski “accepts responsibility but is not remorseful” and “does not regret his actions or behaviors.” The judge also said during sentencing that Pawlowski must be deterred from any “unlawful” activity.
However, Pawlowski does now have a criminal record due to the convictions, which the TDF notes “can lead to legal discrimination and travel restrictions.”
In May, Pawlowski was found guilty at a trial in which no witnesses were called of mischief and breaching a release order for giving a sermon at a Freedom Convoy-related border protest blockade in February 2022 in Coutts, Albertato a group of truckers and protesters blocking entrance into the U.S. state of Montana.
He told the large crowd of protesters who had gathered in support of the trucker strike to peacefully “hold the line.”
Crown lawyers wanted Pawlowski to be jailed for nearly a year, but the pastor’s lawyers were asking for a seven-plus-one-day sentence with time served.
Pawlowski and his brother Dawid made international headlines after they were arrested in a highway takedown in May 2021 for holding worship services contrary to Alberta’s COVID rules regarding church capacity limits.
Both spent a total of three nights in solitary confinement.