EXCLUSIVE: Ontario government BARRED from seizing, destroying Freedom Convoy organizer Chris Barber’s iconic truck 'Big Red'

Ontario Judge Heather Perkins-McVey ruled Friday that the Ontario government will not confiscate and destroy “Big Red,” the truck belonging to Freedom Convoy organizer Chris Barber. Perkins-McVey ruled that “the court is satisfied that the forfeiture of Big Red would be disproportionate.”

“The crown’s application of forfeiture is denied,” she said.

While Barber was sentenced to more than a year of house arrest and community service for his role in the trucker protest of 2022 that sought to end Covid mandates in Canada, the Ontario Crown attorney had sought to seize Barber’s truck and destroy it, on the basis that it was integral to Barber’s “crime.”

The truck has become symbolic of the protest that galvanized millions of supporters across Canada. The mischief trial of Barber and Tamara Lich, which went on for over a year, was a polarizing event, which many saw as a political trial aimed at silencing dissent and chilling protest against draconian government policies.

In an interview with The Post Millennial, Barber described himself as “grateful and thankful that [the judge] ruled against the forfeiture” but commented that her 40-page decision sounded like “talking points from CBC.”

“She was using the words occupation and mass mischief and the blocking of streets; she found that my son was not innocent in this ordeal because he was with me in Ottawa. My parents were not innocent in this because they donated to keep me there in the fight. And, you know, I woke up this morning kind of thinking about just some of the rhetoric and the lettering and the wording used in her decision. And I kind of thought like, that's just unfortunate. They continue down this road,” Barber said.

“I keep reliving it in my head, trying to think, was it that bad? It wasn't that bad. I was in downtown Ottawa for three weeks, and I slept in the downtown core every night, and I slept well; so we did our best. We went through with the best of intentions. The government has still, almost five years later, never been held to account for their actions during the Convoy and their negative treatment towards those patriotic peaceful Canadian protesters who wanted some sort of accountability from the government,” Barber said, adding that the fight was always about ending the “tyrannical mandates and measures that they implemented on Canadians.”

When asked if he is anticipating an appeal from the Crown – that has already appealed his and Lich’s house arrest sentencing – Barber said he has been warned to prepare for exactly that. The Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms – that has greatly assisted with Barber’s massive legal fees – has indicated that Barber should “expect an appeal.”

“The Crown is absolutely vindictive and dead set on pure devastation for anyone that dared to question their morality through the Covid [pandemic] – they're still pushing on this. They won't give up. So I wouldn't put it past them to appeal it. If they do, I feel, you know, personally, I feel it just exposes them more for the crooks that they actually are.”

Barber also had some words of support for Universal Ostrich Farms, which endured a six week occupation from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and the RCMP that ended in the massacre of hundreds of ostriches because they may have once been infected with avian flu.

“There's a family running a business in the country and living in the country of Canada who had the government infringe on their their rights, destroy their livelihood in front of their eyes, and walk away with them, you know, left with a mess and now the financial devastation that that family has to go through for the rest of their life,” Barber said.

Barber condemned those critics of the farm who took to social media “to trash” spokeswoman Katie Pasitney and her mother Karen Espersen.

“I went so far as to call them fake freedom fighters,” Barber said of the on-line haters. “I made a few really upset when I said that, but I said what I said, and I mean it, you know, if this is where we are in the movement right now, where you have to start trashing somebody else who's losing their livelihood because they're getting more attention than you, it's a sad state.”