A month-old injunction against organizers of a truckers ’protest in Ottawa expired Monday. But lawyers who silenced the relentless honking downtown in February are now working to expand and implement a class action lawsuit to ensure residents and local businesses are paid.
Lawyers representing Ottawa residents in the case successfully argued for a Mareva injunction on Feb. 17, a court order aimed at preventing convoy organizers from sell, withdraw, dispose of, transfer, assign up to $ 20 million was raised.
On Monday, Ontario Superior Court Judge, Calum MacLeodsaid the order would be revoked.
The jury MacLeod however, maintains a receiving order ensuring that a third-party agent can continue to hold more than $ 5.7 million in proceeds for the protests until attorneys decide what to do with that amount.
Paul FieldOne of the lawyers involved in the class action said, that wide nets were thrown to recover the funds from the convoy of truckers.
We’ve got most of the funds we’re trying to freeze right nowhe explained.
More money has been put into escrow in the past month
As of March 30, nearly $ 2 million was held by a third party, according to the latest official report from the escrow agent.
Then, on Monday, the court ordered that approximately C $ 3.8 million be raised from the US crowdfunding site GiveSendGo transfer to escrow.
The site transferred this money to a Canadian bank account belonging to the non-profit organization created by the organizers of the convoy of truckers. But the money was eventually recovered by a payment processing company because of freezing orders placed in February to prevent the sum from being used by protesters.
More than 400,000 Canadian dollars in digital currencies were also transferred to escrow.
Class action must continue
Me Champ and his team are expected to expand the scope of the proposed class action to include thousands of defendants-including donors and more truckers involved-as they try to compensate downtown residents and businesses affected. by demonstrations that lasted more than three weeks, paralyzed the city center.
Defendants must file their own documents before the court can decide whether to prove the class action.
We have completed our efforts to locate and control all funds raised to support the convoy and have been donated primarily to allow truckers to continue their work in downtown Ottawa and continue to hurt downtown Ottawa. said Mr. Field.
His team hopes the money is now held by a third party hopefully one day people in downtown Ottawa will get paid.
Most of the funds raised were returned to their donors
The truckers ’rally in Ottawa raised more than $ 20 million in total.
Tamara Lich, the convoy leader who raised large sums of money through her role in organizing the protest – for which she has been charged ever since – helped raise nearly $ 10.1 million before donations were suspended.
The website used to raise this money, GoFundMethen returned most of those funds to donors beginning Feb. 5, the company said.
The nearly $ 1.4 million remaining in Ms. Lich was eventually transferred to escrow.
Two fundraisers were launched on GiveSendGo raised more than $ 12 million and in court on March 9, the co-founder and chief financial officer of GiveSendGo, Jacob Wellssaid donations would be returned to donors.
Asked by CBCthe company declined to disclose the total amount refunded.
The volume of digital currency raised through these fundraisers – 20.7 bitcoins, which is nearly C $ 1.1 million – continues to escape the authorities.
They seem to keep track of these remaining amounts, but it’s very hard to say if they’ll succeed in snatching them.
With information from David Fraser ng CBC News
Source: Radio-Canada
