Activists accused of drug-trafficking sue B.C. in Charter challenge

A controversial two-year program distributing "pre-checked" hard drugs like heroin and cocaine to Vancouver addicts, backed by B.C. NDP Premier David Eby, is now facing a Charter challenge.

Source: Wikimedia Commons

A controversial two-year program distributing “pre-checked” hard drugs like heroin and cocaine to Vancouver addicts, backed by B.C. NDP Premier David Eby, is now facing a Charter challenge in B.C. Supreme Court launched by the very activists who ran the experiment.

The case proceeds only weeks after the pair were convicted of trafficking heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine they admit to buying illegally from the dark web.

The Charter challenge follows a November 7 decision in which Justice Catherine Murray found Jeremy Kalicum, 29, and Eris Nyx, 34, guilty of drug possession and trafficking. In her ruling, she described them as “well-intentioned but law-defying agitators who knowingly pushed boundaries” in their effort to distribute what they called “safe” heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine.

Kalicum and Nyx now argue that failing to provide drug users with laboratory-tested hard drugs violates Section 7 Charter protections to “life, liberty and security of the person.” A supplementary defence argument asserts that “severe substance use disorder” constitutes a disability and should therefore be protected under Section 15 rights against discrimination.

There is no dispute over the trafficking facts; the pair’s activities are extensively documented and date back nearly half a decade.

The activities stretch back to 2021, when the pair met at a “drug user conference” and founded DULF — the “Drug User Liberation Front.”

That July, together with former city councillor Jean Swanson and the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users, they staged a protest outside the Vancouver Police Department, distributing “free, lab-tested heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine” to demonstrate what they called the “commonsense” benefits of a “community-run safe supply program.”

DULF openly explained its model: procure drugs illegally online since no licensed supplier would provide them; store them securely in office safes; test them for fentanyl and benzodiazepines at university labs; package them with health warnings; and distribute them to “screened members” who were over 19 and could be identified as “active users.”

Kalicum and Nyx even pitched the plan to the Vancouver Police Department in a PowerPoint presentation, acknowledging that they intended to “push boundaries.”

According to court records, local policing authorities originally “voiced sympathy for the motivation” but then warned the pair that even giving away drugs could count as trafficking.

The Vancouver Police Department clarified they could “only support what was legal,” so “if DULF was able to obtain an exemption from Health Canada” the VPD “would work with them.”

Months later, Vancouver City Council gave DULF its backing as well, voting almost unanimously to support DULF’s federal exemption application.

But the Health Canada exemption never came.

Health Canada, then under the direction of former health minister Patty Hajdu, delayed the decision for nearly a year before eventually denying the request in July 2022, citing the dark web sourcing as “incompatible with public safety goals.”

E-mail correspondence between DULF and Health Canada reviewed in court this week shows a bureaucrat asking Kalicum if he was aware of a “licensed dealer,” or legal provider, for the drugs he intended to sell.

Kalicum responded “no,” that he was not aware of a federally “licensed dealer” for heroin, cocaine, or crystal meth — effectively dooming DULF’s exemption application and a later appeal.

Undaunted, the duo trudged ahead with their plans, enlisting the support of Dr. Mark Lysyshyn, Vancouver Coastal Health’s deputy chief medical officer.

Lysyshyn praised the plan’s potential to reduce overdoses by providing tested substances, despite knowing the drugs would be sourced illegally and distributed.

The DULF “compassion club” pilot did not operate on volunteer effort alone. Financial records filed in court show the project received at least $200,000 in public funding from Vancouver Coastal Health.

Together, in the summer of 2022, the fully funded DULF group found 42 individuals who met “their criteria” and began providing them with laboratory-tested cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine that they procured over the dark web and then tested to ensure they were “safe.”

Several studies of the DULF experiment found that none of the participants overdosed during the study period. However, another study documented significant diversion of the drugs to people outside the monitored cohort, complicating the interpretation of earlier findings.

Public backlash erupted after a 2023 Economist article dubbed DULF “ethical drug dealers,” prompting federal Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre to slam the provincial NDP government for bankrolling what he called a “disgrace.”

Bowing to pressure, the B.C. Minister of Health ordered the public health authority to yank funding for the group and force DULF to wind down its activities.

But then, on October 25, just six days before their deadline on a total shutdown, the VPD raided the DULF’s site and arrested Kalicum.

It was a stunning reversal for both the policing agency and the provincial government, who had once not only tacitly supported the project but also handed it hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxpayer funds to help it operate.

B.C.’s NDP Premier David Eby had once called DULF’s activities “essential, life-saving work,” while acknowledging that “work” was illegal.

“There is no question that their intentions were and are good. They want to save lives. But were they exempt from criminal liability?” Justice Murray asked rhetorically in her verdict decision in November.

Following the guilty verdict, the judge has ruled that sentencing for Kalicum and Nyx would go into “abeyance” pending the ongoing Charter challenge, bringing us to the events unfolding in Vancouver’s B.C. Superior Court this week.

Kalicum has spent the past three days on the stand outlining DULF’s operations and the rationale behind their Charter claims and answering questions from the Crown. Nyx is expected to testify next as the hearing continues this week.

It remains unclear how long it will take to hear the Charter challenge in its entirety. True North is following the proceedings as they unfold.