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Canada: Pastor wins appeal against conviction for defying COVID-19 orders

by Karen Faulkner, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – Canadian pastor Artur Pawlowski has won his appeal against a conviction for holding church services in defiance of Alberta public health COVID-19 restrictions, the Washington Examiner reports.

Leader of Street Church in Calgary, Pawlowski was arrested and fined numerous times for violating Alberta pandemic health regulations by holding church services and other gatherings, including feeding the homeless and protesting vaccine mandates, the Examiner said.

Pawlowski has been virulently opposed to Canada’s COVID-19 health regulations, publicly likening Alberta health authorities to the “Nazis” and “Gestapo” who launched WW2 and exterminated six million Jews in the Holocaust.

Pawlowski was again arrested on May 8, 2021, and this time he was charged with organizing and inviting others to an illegal in-person gathering, the Examiner reports. He appeared before an Alberta court in October and was found in contempt of violating health regulations. The pastor’s brother, Dawid Pawlowski, was also arrested and charged and found to be in contempt with him.

However, on Friday, an Alberta appeals court overturned Pawlowski’s conviction on the grounds that the regulations he had allegedly breached had not been “sufficiently clear and unambiguous,” the Examiner said.

“The finding of contempt and the sanction order are set aside,” the appeals court ruled. “The fines that have been paid by them are to be reimbursed.” Pawlowski’s legal costs are also to be reimbursed, the court said.