Canada: Sentencing of land defenders sends ‘chilling message’ about Indigenous rights

The sentencing of three land defenders criminalized by Canada sends a chilling message about the threats facing people and Nations on the front lines of the struggle for Indigenous rights and environmental justice.

On Friday, a British Columbia judge handed down sentences for three Indigenous land defenders who were arrested in November 2021 during a heavily militarized Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) raid on the unceded ancestral territory of the Wet’suwet’en Nation. Sleydo’ (Molly Wickham), a Wing Chief (Cas Yikh or Grizzly Bear House) of the Gidimt’en Clan of the Wet’suwet’en Nation, Shaylynn Sampson, a Gitxsan with Wet’suwet’en family connections, and Corey “Jayohcee” Jocko, a Kanien’kehá:ka (Mohawk) from Akwesasne, were later charged and convicted for allegedly breaching a B.C. court injunction that banned land defence actions near the construction of the Coastal GasLink (CGL) liquefied natural gas pipeline.

Each of the land defenders’ sentences include jail time: 17 days in jail for Sleydo’, 12 for Jocko, and nine for Sampson. However, the judge suspended the implementation of those sentences and ordered the defenders to complete 150 hours of community service rather than serve time behind bars. In explaining his decision to suspend the defenders’ jail sentences, the judge said he took into account the Province of British Columbia’s and the Government of Canada’s disrespect for the rights and interests of the Wet’suwet’en Nation.

“While we are relieved that Sleydo’, Shaylynn and Corey were allowed to walk free, the application of jail sentences – suspended or not – sends a chilling message to land defenders who act to protect Indigenous rights and territory in the face of destructive mega-projects,” said Ana Piquer, Americas Director at Amnesty International.

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