File photo (image credit - CFJC Today)

By Michael Reeve

DEFAMATION SUIT

Hamer-Jackson-versus-Neustaeter case on hold awaiting available judge

Jan 20, 2025 | 6:00 PM

KAMLOOPS — After the City of Kamloops spent last Wednesday (Jan. 15) in the Kamloops Law Courts fighting a petition on the alternative approval process (AAP) for Build Kamloops, city council was set to take centre stage once more along Columbia Street.

Monday (Jan. 20) was set to be the first day of a week-long court case between Mayor Reid Hamer-Jackson and Councillor Katie Neustaeter, but the lack of an available judge has stalled proceedings, ahead of potential financial concerns for the mayor.

“We were going to look for an adjournment anyways,” Hamer-Jackson told CFJC News. “We don’t have a lot of information. But when this started, David McMillan — who was a friend of mine — was going to do this on contingency. But since then, we have had to hire these other lawyers, and then ran into financial things. I wasn’t expecting to have a whole bunch of Code of Conduct complaints, which used up funds that I put down on a retainer for this case.”

The mayor did not have an exact figure on costs he’s ensued from Code of Conduct complaints.

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Hamer-Jackson is taking Neustaeter to court for defamation, stemming from March 2023, when Neustaeter read a statement in chambers on behalf of the entire council.

“It’s time for this to end. It’s absolutely ridiculous. It was a frivolous and vexatious lawsuit to begin with and now, the waste to taxpayers dollars to the court system itself — it’s absurd. So, I’m frustrated. I know this will come to an end eventually, but it should be sooner rather than later,” said Neustaeter.

Neustaeter will be seeking cost to save the taxpayers money if the suit is dismissed. The participants are in a day-to-day holding pattern awaiting a judge, but once one is available, Neustaeter is hoping to proceed quickly and avoid further delays.

“We should be spending our time and energy working on things like the sobering (centre) assessment that we just had significant progress on. Working on bringing down the tax rate for the people of Kamloops, working on the housing challenges that we have, looking at the new access hub and how that will function as a model that could be a first of it’s kind in B.C. These are the things we should be spending our energy on but instead we spend it on the chaos of Reid Hamer-Jackson,” said Neustaeter.

The mayor, who was previously set to represent himself in the case, is looking to secure a new lawyer but highlighted challenges in that pursuit.

“I do have some assets and once I sell assets, we will be ready to go. I’ve been looking for lawyers because there are contingency lawyers around but apparently they don’t want to take on my case or cases,” said Hamer-Jackson.

In addition to the current case, Hamer-Jackson still has other outstanding lawsuits versus Kamloops developer Joshua Knaak, in which the mayor is the plaintiff, and his former lawyer McMillan, in which Hamer-Jackson is the defendant.

None of the allegations has been tested in court.