{"id":216751,"date":"2019-05-30T21:22:30","date_gmt":"2019-05-31T01:22:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=216751"},"modified":"2019-05-30T21:22:30","modified_gmt":"2019-05-31T01:22:30","slug":"out-of-alberta-prosecutor-sought-to-advise-on-ucp-leadership-investigation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2019\/05\/30\/out-of-alberta-prosecutor-sought-to-advise-on-ucp-leadership-investigation\/","title":{"rendered":"Out of Alberta prosecutor sought to advise on UCP leadership investigation"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
FILE: Premier Jason Kenney and Cabinet are sworn in at Government House, in Edmonton on Tuesday, April 30, 2019. (Photo<\/a> by Chris Schwarz\/Alberta Government via Premier of Alberta\/Flickr<\/a>, CC BY-ND 2.0<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

EDMONTON \u2014 Alberta is seeking a special outside prosecutor to assist Mounties investigating whether fraud was committed in the United Conservative Party leadership race won by Jason Kenney.<\/p>\n

\u201cBased on recent information, the (Alberta Crown Prosecution Service) will seek an out-of-province prosecutor to provide advice to police on any matters arising during the investigation,\u201d Sarah Langley, acting head of the service, said in a statement Thursday.<\/p>\n

Langley did not provide details about what new information prompted the decision.<\/p>\n

The service \u201chas closely monitored this matter to ensure the file is appropriately managed,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs independent prosecutors, our role includes continually reassessing matters based on the latest information we have available.<\/p>\n

\u201cGoing forward, an independent extra-provincial prosecutor will be responsible for providing advice to the police at their request. Prosecutors do not oversee investigations.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alberta’s Opposition New Democrats has been calling for a special prosecutor since Kenney took over as premier on April 30 and named Doug Schweitzer as justice minister and attorney general.<\/p>\n

NDP Leader Rachel Notley said a clean line is needed to avoid a conflict of interest \u2014 and the perception of a conflict \u2014 given that Kenney and Schweitzer were both candidates in the leadership race and that Alberta’s prosecutors now work for them.<\/p>\n

Schweitzer was questioned by police about the investigation last weekend, but didn’t disclose it publicly until the CBC reported it on Monday.<\/p>\n

Schweitzer and Kenney have said a special prosecutor is not needed because they respect the independence of the prosecution branch.<\/p>\n

Schweitzer has refused to say what he talked about with police, except to say they told him he is not a suspect.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, Schweitzer said: \u201cIt’s important to know that this decision (for a special prosecutor) was made independent of me or any other elected official.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe process worked exactly as it was supposed to, free from any influence.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously this is a decision that we called for and we’re glad that the government has finally listened to us,\u201d Notley said.<\/p>\n

Kenney told the house last week that police have not questioned him.<\/p>\n

The case also involves UCP backbencher Peter Singh. He won the Calgary-East seat in the April election, just days after police raided his auto-repair shop and confiscated a computer hard drive in what Singh’s lawyer has said was part of the UCP leadership fraud investigation.<\/p>\n

Singh has said he is innocent, and he has never been charged. Kenney has resisted Opposition calls to move him out of the UCP caucus until the matter is resolved.<\/p>\n

The NDP renewed those calls Thursday after Star Edmonton reported that Alberta’s elections commissioner is investigating Singh over allegations that bribery was used to gain his UCP nomination.<\/p>\n

The elections commissioner is also investigating the UCP leadership race and has levelled fines over illegal funding for Calgary businessman Jeff Callaway, who was also a candidate in the leadership race.<\/p>\n

Kenney has faced \u2014 and rejected \u2014 allegations that Callaway was a puppet who ran on Kenney’s behalf solely to attack opponent and former Wildrose party leader Brian Jean while Kenney stayed above the fray.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

EDMONTON \u2014 Alberta is seeking a special outside prosecutor to assist Mounties investigating whether fraud was committed in the United …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":216759,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-216751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news-ca","category-news","mauthors-dean-bennett","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216751"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216751\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":216761,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216751\/revisions\/216761"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/216759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}