Doug McCallum waits for the start of a mayoral candidates meeting in Surrey, B.C., on Monday, Sept. 26, 2022. McCallum has been found not guilty of public mischief by a provincial court judge. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck
SURREY, B.C. – Former mayor of Surrey, B.C., Doug McCallum has been found not guilty of public mischief by a provincial court judge.
McCallum was charged after telling police that a woman opposed to his plans to replace the Surrey RCMP with a municipal police force used her car to run over his foot in a grocery store parking lot last year.
Judge Reginald Harris says the verdict hinged on whether McCallum intentionally misled police and, if so, whether he intended for Debi Johnstone to be suspected of a crime she did not commit.
Police declined to charge Johnstone after the Sept. 4, 2021 confrontation.
But Harris says he found Johnstone’s testimony unreliable when she said she didn’t run over McCallum’s foot.
Harris says although video showed McCallum was not “pinned” by Johnstone’s car, as the former mayor had said, he was satisfied beyond a reasonable doubt that McCallum’s foot had been run over.
“In my view, there’s ample objectively verifiable evidence affirming Mr. McCallum’s assertion regarding his foot. Thus, I conclude his statements on this point are reliable and true.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 21, 2022.
