Former far-right Mississauga mayoralty candidate arrested after failing to serve 2 jail sentences

Mississauga | Ontario | COVID | Latest News | Politics |

By

Published January 4, 2022 at 5:41 pm

Former far-right Mississauga mayoral candidate Kevin J. Johnston was supposed to appear in a Toronto courthouse on Tuesday to begin serving a jail sentence.

Instead, he was some 2,500 kilometres away, trying to cross the Saskatchewan-Montana border on foot after failing to complete a separate jail sentence in Alberta. Multiple media reports said that Johnston was arrested by the United States border patrol agency, where he will be returned to the custody of the Calgary police.

Johnston is facing an 18-month sentence in Ontario for six counts of contempt. He was due in court on Tuesday, which would have been the first day he could legally re-enter. That sentence stems from his persistence in directing racist and Islamophobic attacks at Mohamed Fakih after the Mississauga entrepreneur and philanthrophist won a $2.5-million defamation judgement against Johnston in 2019.

Fakih, who last week was named to the Order of Canada, has since successfully won over $200,000 in court courts from Johnston. The judges who handled the contempt charges and the awarding of costs each said that Johnston essentially failed to take the court proceedings seriously.

In Alberta, Johnston was part of the anti-mask movement and was charged with defying a court order that is aimed to control frequent rule breakers who incite others to defy public health restrictions. He also pleaded guilty to criminal harassment of an Alberta health inspector and causing a disturbance.

Johnston was serving his sentence in Alberta on weekends. On the final weekend, he was a no-show.

He also faces an assault charge in British Columbia, the CBC reported.

In October, Johnston received 1,565 votes, or about 0.4 per cent of the total, in Calgary’s mayoral election.

He was also on the mayoral ballot in Mississauga in 2014 and ’18. In his second bid in 2018, he garnered 16,000 votes to finish a distant second behind Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie.

insauga's Editorial Standards and Policies advertising