Alberta Justice spokespeople deliver duelling statements on prosecutor email review

Editor's Note:This articlefollows a Jan. 19, 2023 story that has been updated. As detailed in the Editor's Note accompanying that story, CBC could not substantiate the content of emails referenced here or confirm their existence. Readthe full Editor's Note here.

An email probe into whether Alberta Premier Danielle Smith's office interfered with Crown prosecutors took a confusing turn Friday after two government spokespeople delivered duelling statements that raised questions over how far back the search went.

The review was ordered by Smith a week ago to respond to allegations in a CBC story that reported a staffer in the premier's office emailed prosecutors last fall to question decisions and direction on cases stemming from a blockade at the Canada-U. S. border crossing at Coutts, Alta. CBC News has not seen the emails.

The Justice Department said Monday it had done a four-month search of ingoing, outgoing and deleted emails and found no evidence of contact.

Alberta Justice communications director Charles Mainville said in an email reply to CBC News on January 24 when asked about the retention period for the Government of Alberta, "The GoA has a retention period of 30 days for deleted emails. This means that once an email is delete[d] by a user, the email would still be accessible for a period of 30 days"; meaning the search for deleted emails may not have covered the entire time period in question.

On Thursday night, Ethan Lecavalier-Kidney, a spokesman for Justice Minister Tyler Shandro, responded to questions about Mainville's statement. He said while emails are deleted after 30 days, they live on in the system for another 30 and could have been checked that far back by investigators.

"For example, if an email was deleted on Oct. 17, 2022, the email would no longer be accessible to the user as of Nov. 16, 2022, but would continue to be available to our investigation team until Dec. 16, 2022," said Lecavalier-Kidney in his statement.

A 60-day search would have stretched back to late November, capturing all but the first six weeks of Smith's United Conservative Party government. Smith was sworn in as premier on Oct. 11.

But while Lecavalier-Kidney's statement said investigators could go back 60 days, it did not state if they did.

When asked Friday to clarify whether investigators did go back 30 or 60 days on the deleted emails, Lecavalier-Kidney did not respond to questions while Mainville reissued the original statements in an email.

The government has also delivered conflicting messages on who was investigated in the review.

Smith promised that emails from all Crown prosecutors and the 34 staffers in her office would be checked.

However, the Justice Department later said emails between "relevant" prosecutors and Smith staffers were checked. It did not say how it determined who was relevant.

Smith has said she did not direct prosecutors in the Coutts cases and the email review exonerated her office from what she called "baseless" allegations in the CBC story.