No criminal charges in 2017 UCP leadership race
Allegations of fraud probed by RCMP
EDMONTON • After a fiveyear investigation, Alberta RCMP said Friday there is not enough evidence to charge anyone in connection to allegations of fraud during the 2017 United Conservative Party leadership race.
The case was opened in 2019, after former UCP MLA Prab Gill filed two complaints to the RCMP over the leadership contest that saw Jason Kenney win 61 per cent of the vote, and eventually become premier.
The so-called kamikaze leadership campaign of Jeff Callaway came under the Mounties’ microscope after allegations he entered the race only to attack fellow candidate Brian Jean and pull out to endorse Kenney. The Callaway campaign collected about $95,000 in donations from those who may have thought he was a legitimate candidate, prompting the RCMP to look into potential criminal fraud.
While Callaway was fined $70,000 for his part in the race by Elections Alberta, RCMP said Friday investigators did not uncover evidence to charge anyone with fraud. A judge last year also ordered the election commissioner to reconsider Callaway’s fine. By late 2019, more than $211,000 worth of fines had been levied by the election commissioner in relation to the Callaway campaign by the election commissioner.
The race was also tainted with accusations of voter fraud. Some registered party members said they never cast a ballot, even though voting records showed ballots were cast under their names.
Alberta RCMP Supt. Rick Jané said police looked at the UCP’S voter database of more than 60,000 voters and flagged less than 200 “suspicious” votes. However, while they suspected instances of identity fraud, there wasn’t enough evidence to tie them to any suspects or lay charges.
Gill originally alleged that thousands of fake votes were cast for Kenney after Kenney’s campaign team created fraudulent email addresses in order to obtain a personal identification number (PIN) needed to vote electronically. At the time, Kenney pushed back, calling it a ridiculous conspiracy theory.
Although the UCP voter database showed if a vote had been cast using a specific PIN number, RCMP said Friday because it was a secret ballot, it did not indicate which candidate got the check mark.
Jané also emphasized that the 200 “suspicious” votes, even if they could be proven in court as being fraudulent, would not have impacted the leadership contest because Kenney won by such a sizable margin. In the end, Kenney took 36,625 votes, compared to 18,336 for Jean, who is now the UCP Energy Minister, and former UCP MLA Doug Schweitzer’s 4,273.
“Even for cases that appear to be voter fraud or identity fraud, there can be innocent explanations,” Jané said, saying it wasn’t illegal for one phone number or email to receive multiple PINS.
“This wasn’t a widespread situation, there was no technological hacking, there was no use of foreign interference. This was a situation where it appears that, and it is possible in some cases, somebody obtained personal information that allowed them to register and receive a PIN to vote and then pass that vote,” he said.
However, RCMP declined to name anyone else who was the subject of the investigation, nor would it discuss the details of the evidence, or lack thereof, that it found that did not lead to charges.
In a statement posted to social media Friday, Kenney said the RCMP’S announcement confirmed that there was no wrongdoing on his part or his leadership campaign, and the complaints were “ridiculous, bad faith complaints (that) led to a string of defamatory accusations.”
“Today’s outcome is a total vindication of my 2017 leadership campaign, and the UCP’S administration of that election,” he wrote, adding the investigation cost millions of dollars “of personnel time and related expenses.”
The case involved the work of 65 investigators, 1,200 voter interviews, and translation assistance for Arabic, South Asian and Chinese languages.
It cost almost $461,000 in overtime and travel expenses — not including regular salaries. Jané declined to say how much those salaries might add up to, saying it would only be a guess because some police officers weren’t dedicated to the case the entire time. “It costs money to investigate things thoroughly, and this was not an outlier,” he said, adding that the completeness of the investigation is the standard it should be judged by — not the lack of criminal charges.
“In this case, experienced criminal investigators tested these allegations. In the end, Albertans can be confident that a thorough investigation, independent of government, was conducted.”
After the RCMP sought advice from Alberta Crown prosecutors, they were shuffled to the Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General who assigned their own Crown prosecutors to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest.