Thread by @proctor_jason

Crown lawyer Robert Frater says he's going to speak for 30 minutes only - asks the judge to "step out of the weeds"

He says there are two different narratives - the exciting one - and the more "prosaic" one ... the one involving conspiracy ... and the one that just involves two public bodies trying to figure out how to go about an unprecedented situation

Frater tells the judge not to lose focus on the law ... says she needs to keep the applicable test for abuse of process in mind from Regina vs Babos ... scc-csc.lexum.com/scc-csc/scc-cs…

Going to point out here that Crown lawyer Robert Frater literally wrote a book that "is an essential text for Crown counsel who needs to operate within the rules of law and for defence counsel who need to identify when prosecutorial misconduct occurs" ...

Frater says the Crown disputes the defence's argument that the judge can consider the cumulative effect of all four branches of alleged abuse ... he says the ONLY cumulative argument can be made in what happened in the second branch (re - Meng's rights during arrest)

Frater says there are 5 "overarching questions" ... 1 - did US request covert criminal investigation and participate in coverup 2 - did RCMP and CBSA agree to participate and cover up

3 - was the order RCMP and CBSA agreed to do work lawful 4 - did conduct of either RCMP or CBSA breach Charter rights and 5 - was information improperly shared with US and was that covered up

Frater says if #MengWanzhou lawyers don't establish the existence of a conspiracy - there's no reason for the RCMP and CBSA to do the things they allegedly did ... "the story doesn't make sense - if they didn't show that"

Frater says the judge is repeatedly being asked to find the opposite of what the evidence was ... says the judge is being asked to find lying by witnesses on a "grand scale"

"It's quite an extraordinary amount of lying" that they're asking the judge to find - Frater says.

Frater says there were deficiencies in note taking ... but claims the witnesses were credible ... says #MengWanzhou lawyers also repeatedly asked judge to draw speculative inferences - not reasonable ones from the evidence

Lastly - Frater says they disagree on "key areas of the law" ... speaks to the word "immediate" on the provisional arrest warrant ... "it means the orders must be carried out in a reasonable manner"

Judge interrupts ... says that's "interesting" ... but the "manner" is not necessarily about the timing ... Frater agrees but says "immediate doesn't necessarily mean come hell or high water, you've got to do it now"

Frater says "they undoubtably all mean right away ... but what does that mean in the circumstances of this case." He says they were able to achieve what they were expected to do - and what the CBSA had to carry out

Frater says the passcodes were properly obtained by CBSA for CBSA purposes - they shouldn't have been passed to RCMP, but it was done by mistake and there was no prejudice to #MengWanzhou

Frater says "both sides are relying on the same material to ask you to draw different conclusions" ...

Crown says "corners were cut to some extent by necessity" ... but this is not a trial ... but says there's a problem with some of evidence as hearsay - that the judge may have to figure out given the circumstances of the #MengWanzhou case

Frater is done - hands over to colleagues

First Crown lawyer up is Diba Majzub ... says no evidence of US-led covert criminal investigation ... that RCMP and CBSA made decisions based on context not conspiracy ... CBSA had bona fide concerns about #MengWanzhou admissibility ... and no CBSA "mindset" to share info

Majzub says “there is no direct evidence that the US led such a plan or was part of such a plan" ... he says that without proof of conspiracy - the defence argument fails ... but the judge is challenging that ...

She says she wants the Crown to know that - essentially - even if she doesn't find a conspiracy, she's still open to considering that there may have been misconduct on behalf of RCMP and CBSA