A8 O THEGLOBEANDMAIL| WEDNESDAY,OCTOBER16,
Alberta prosecutors are appeal-
ing a not-guilty verdict in the case
of a couple who faced criminal
charges for turning to natural re-
medies instead of seeking medi-
cal attention for their sick son.
David and Collet Stephan were
acquitted in Lethbridge, Alta.,
last month for failing to provide
the necessaries of life in the
death of their 19-month-old Eze-
kiel, who died in 2012. The
Crown’s appeal alleges that Jus-
tice Terry Clackson erred in his
reasoning and that his comments
about an African-born doctor
show bias.
Justice Clackson’s complaints
about the medical examiner’s ac-
cent and word choice in his judg-
ment led to several protests to
the Canadian Judicial Council, in-
cluding a letter signed by 42 doc-
tors and lawyers who asked for an
investigation.
The couple testified that they
thought the infant had croup and
tried to treat him with a smooth-
ie made of garlic, onion and
horseradish. They called an am-
bulance when he stopped breath-
ing. He later died in hospital. The
medical examiner, Bamidele
Adeagbo, concluded the boy died
of bacterial meningitis.
In his decision, the judge sided
with a defence expert who said
the boy died of a lack of oxygen
during the ambulance ride rather
than bacterial meningitis.
The appeal states that the
Crown believes “the trial judge
erred in assessing credibility by
taking into account irrelevant
considerations.”The appeal, filed last Friday in
Calgary, is the latest step in a case
that has been in the courts for
seven years. The Stephans were
found guilty by a jury in 2016, but
the Supreme Court of Canada set
aside that conviction and or-
dered a new trial, which ended in
a not-guilty decision last month.
Shawn Buckley, who repre-
sented the couple in the first trial
and was Ms. Stephan’s attorney
in the second, said he was sur-
prised by the Crown’s decision to
appeal: “Really, we need to go
through this again?” he asked.
“Regardless of how you feel
about this, it’s been seven years.
They have four kids, three who
didn’t exist at the time Ezekiel
died. How long do you keep a
family totally terrorized with le-
gal charges holding over their
heads, let alone destroying them
financially with legal bills?” he
added.
The Alberta Ministry of Justice
declined to comment on the no-
tice of appeal. Speaking with re-
porters in Calgary, Justice Minis-
ter Doug Schweitzer said he
wasn’t involved in the decision to
ask Alberta’s highest court to
open the case for a third time.
“We leave the decisions regarding
certain appeals to the lawyers
who are handling those files,” he
said.
Part of the appeal will focus on
Justice Clackson’s treatment of
Dr. Adeagbo. The appeal docu-
ment says the “judge’s com-
ments in the trial gave rise to a
reasonable apprehension of bi-
as.”
In his written decision, Justice
Clackson said the Nigerian-born
medical examiner spoke with an
accent and was sometimes hard
to understand.
“His ability to articulate his
thoughts in an understandable
fashion was severely compro-
mised by: his garbled enuncia-
tion; his failure to use appropri-
ate endings for plurals and past
tenses; his failure to use the ap-
propriate definite and indefinite
articles; his repeated emphasis of
the wrong syllables; dropping his
Hs; mispronouncing his vowels;
and the speed of his responses,”
Justice Clackson wrote.
Mr. Buckley said he had not ex-
pected the backlash to Justice
Clackson’s written decision. He
said he thought the judge had
treated every witness fairly. “The
concern the trial judge was hav-
ing with things like enunciation
was how do you have a fair trial
when people are having trouble
understanding what is being
said? That has nothing to do with
race,” he said.Crownappeals
not-guilty
verdictin
Alberta
toddler ’sdeath
JUSTINGIOVANNETTICALGARYTheAlbertaMinistry
ofJusticedeclinedto
commentonthenotice
ofappeal.W
ith a president without prece-
dent, and a struggle between
the executive and legislative
branches that tears the late
18th-century parchment of the U.S. Consti-
tution, Washington now enters a moment
altogether different from anything in
American history.
The capital is adrift even as the two ma-
jor parties drift apart. The lines between
foreign and domestic policy are blurred as
congressional Democrats argue that Presi-
dent Donald Trump’s interference in Uk-
raine was spawned by domestic political
factors. The White House is ignoring con-
gressional demands with which all previ-
ous presidents facing similar circumstanc-
es agreed, or were forced by the courts to
agree, to comply.
At stake – here both sides share this view
- is the future of U.S. democracy itself.
One side, arguing that Mr. Trump has vi-
olated tradition and trampled on the rule
of law, sees the titanic struggle of the Presi-
dent and congressional Democrats as a test
of democratic rule. The other side, arguing
that its partisan rivals are seeking nothing
less than the removal from office of a legal-
ly elected President they find odious, is just
as forceful in regarding this conflict as a test
of democracy itself.
And both sides see this as a modern-day
range war, a struggle to determine what
kind of country the United States shall be
that will determine whether its ancient
constitutional balance can stand the tests
presented by a President such as Mr. Trump
or by lawmakers such as House Speaker
Nancy Pelosi. And yet in their basic agree-
ment – in clothing their arguments in the
shawls of democracy – the two sides could
not be farther apart.
The result is a conflict of obstinance –
and obstruction. It tests the will of those
people who support impeachment against
the willfulness of the President, who is
stoking passions among his base. It in-
volves a fresh dispute between two branch-
es of government that is so fundamental it
may have to be resolved by the third
branch, the judiciary led by a Supreme
Court that itself is bitterly politicized.
The three earlier impeachment efforts
in the U.S. – Andrew Johnson (1868); Ri-
chard Nixon (1974); Bill Clinton (1998) – of-
fer no buoys for this passage.
Mr. Johnson and Mr. Clinton were im-
peached in the House of Representatives
but acquitted in the Senate, and Mr. Nixon
resigned before sure House impeachment
and likely Senate conviction. There are on-
ly surface comparisons between the ordeal
involving Mr. Trump and the crises that en-
gulfed the other three.
In this case, the basis for impeachment
involves the President’s interchanges with
a foreign government, one of the very few
specific actions the American Founders be-
lieved should lead to impeachment. There
are no defenders among the President’s
party opponents and virtually no defectors
from the President’s party. The offensive
being mounted by the White House is just
as ferocious and dangerous as the one be-
ing conducted by the House.
In this case, the White House is arguing
that the President’s supporters are not be-
ing given customary rights in the commit-
tee deliberations leading to the House im-
peachment vote. The President’s oppo-
nents are arguing that Mr. Trump, in not
conforming to traditions and laws that gov-
ern the balance of powers, has ignited a
constitutional crisis, a fearful phrase rarely
employed in U.S. politics.
“Here President Trump is treating the
entire congressional inquiry as illegal and
saying the White House doesn’t have to fol-
low the Constitution,” said Kenneth Gorm-
ley, a former law school dean and author of
The Death of American Innocence: Clinton vs.
Starr. “That approach has never been used
before. It’s a scorched-earth approach, but
then again, scorched-earth approaches
have worked out pretty well for the Presi-
dent.”
Indeed, both the President and congres-
sional Democrats are resorting to form,with Mr. Trump excoriating his rivals in
ways that Mr. Johnson (an avowed enemy
of the Radical Republicans who wanted to
prosecute a punitive Reconstruction after
the Civil War) and Mr. Nixon (a life-long fig-
ure of derision for Democrats) never con-
templated. Late last week, he said that Ms.
Pelosi “hates the United States of America.”
In her account of the Johnson impeach-
ment, Brenda Wineapple spoke of Mr.
Johnson’s “scrappy populism,” but high-
lighted his endearing sense of humour. Mr.
Nixon spoke archly of his rivals in private –
these remarks only became public when
the Supreme Court ruled that his White
House tapes could not be kept private – and
constructed an “enemies list,” but that
didn’t become public until White House
counsel John Dean mentioned its existence
in passing before the Senate Watergate
Committee.
By forbidding aides to appear before
congressional committees, Mr. Trump has
forestalled any such eventuality involving
him or his controversial outreach to Ukrai-
nian President Volodymyr Zelensky. He
has also deepened the crisis.
The congressional inquiry will continue,
as will the White House refusal to co-oper-
ate. Ms. Pelosi has indicated that the issue
of House impeachment could be resolved
as early as the days leading to American
Thanksgiving, which this year is Nov. 28.
The repercussions from this struggle, how-
ever, will last far longer – and it will be some
time until the country experiences a reviv-
al of what one of its greatest composers, Ge-
orge Gershwin, once called its “unduplicat-
ed national pep.” That pep, along with the
norms of American politics, have been sus-
pended for the duration.SpecialtoTheGlobeandMailWashingtonentersuncharted
territoryinimpeachmentbattle
Thereareonlysurface
comparisonsbetweenTrump’s
situationandthecasesof
formerpresidentswhofaced
beingremovedfromoffice
DAVIDSHRIBMAN
ANALYSISU.S.PresidentDonaldTrump,seenataneventattheWhiteHouseonTuesday,has
forbidden his aides from appearing before congressional committees concerning his
impeachment.EVANVUCCI/ASSOCIATEDPRESS‘T
hey don’t come here for the
parsley.”
The words of the late Leroy
Earl (Bus) Fuller, a restaurant
pioneer who changed the way Canadians
dine out, hangs in the new IT room at Earls
Kitchen + Bar headquarters in Vancouver.
Mr. Fuller, who founded the Earls and
Joey restaurant chains and invented the
now-widely imitated premium-casual
chain-dining concept, wasn’t a penny-
pincher. In fact, his family says he was gen-
erous to a fault and could often be found
slipping hundred-dollar bills to dishwash-
ers.
But he understood the value of the al-
mighty dollar, never forgot his humble ori-
gins and didn’t believe that customers
should have to pay for frilly garnishes they
couldn’t eat.
Mr. Fuller, a larger-than-life character
with a grizzled beard, love of saucy limer-
icks and lack of pretension, died last week
at the age of 90 in West Vancouver, B.C.
“There are still no garnishes on the
plates and that’s a rule,” said his son Stan
Fuller, with whom he founded the first
Earls, in Edmonton in 1982.
Today, there are 65 Earls and 28 Joey res-
taurants in Canada and the United States,
plus 12 Local restaurants and one Beach
House run by a family company controlled
by Mr. Fuller’s four sons: Stan, Jeff, Stewart
and Clay. The family also controls a major-
ity stake in Cactus Club Café restaurants.
Earls, in particular, is well known for ele-
vating the chain-dining experience with
premium wines, quality ingredients, ap-
proachable takes on popular world cui-
sines and comely dining rooms.
But in 1982, when the first Earls opened
with a simple menu of 16 burgers – all
made fresh to order (which was rare) –
craft beers and an exotic outdoor patio,
Western Canada was in the midst of a re-
cession. It was an inexpensive, laid-back
restaurant where people could go out for a
nice meal at prices they could afford.
Leroy Earl Fuller was born on Dec. 20,
1928, in Cincinnati, Ohio. His father, Cecil
Earl Fuller, was a hard-rock miner. When
he was young, the family lived transiently,
moving from camp to camp all over the
United States. The younger Fuller got the
nickname Bus from his childhood nick-
name, Buster.
“He came from nothing,” Clay Fuller
said. “There is a picture from the time they
lived in Kentucky that makesThe Beverly
Hillbillieslook like rock stars.”
The family settled in Sunburst, Mont.,
where Mr. Fuller graduated from high
school and met his future wife, Marilyn.
They married just as he was about to head
overseas to fight in the Korean War.
Mr. Fuller’s tour of duty was abruptly cut
short. About two months after he landed,
his unit was hit by mortar fire and a piece
of shrapnel ripped through his hand. His
life was likely saved by a copper plate on
the cover of a military-issue Gideon Bible
stuffed in his chest pocket. He spent two
years in recovery, was awarded a Purple
Heart and held on to that lucky Bible with
its twisted plate, but never talked about
the experience.
Back in Montana, Mr. Fuller returned to
work as a machinist for the Texas Co. In
1954, his wife (who died in 1975) persuaded
him to open a drive-in diner called the
Green & White. They ran it together for two
years, while he continued working at the
Texaco refinery.
“That first year we did $32,000 and I
made more money at that little restaurant
than I did working at the Texas Company
40 hours a week, 51 weeks a year,” Mr. Fuller
told a reporter last year, when receiving the
Rosanna Caira Lifetime Achievement
Award from Foodservice and Hospitality
magazine.
Mr. Fuller sold the Green & White and
used that money to move the family to Ed-
monton, where he opened his first A&W
franchise. He later bought out the A&W
franchisee for Vancouver Island and Van-couver’s Lower Mainland. In 1968, they
moved to Vancouver and over the next few
years, he grew the A&W chain to 47 loca-
tions in Alberta and British Columbia.
During that time, the A&W operators
across Canada folded into a public compa-
ny called Controlled Foods. “Unfortunate-
ly, some of the operators were more honest
than others about their sales and profit-
ability,” Stan Fuller said. “He lost some eq-
uity, but was made president and that’s
how Fuller’s [a pioneering all-day coffee
concept] and Corkscrew [a steakhouse
chain] was created.”
Mr. Fuller’s sons recall him being as
tough as he was kind-hearted. But he
played as hard as he worked. “There was a
rule in the office,” Stewart Fuller said. “Af-
ter it closed down on Friday, if he caught
you with a pen, you were fired.”
He valued family time above all else but
he wouldn’t stand for any nonsense.
Clay recalls the time when, as a teenag-
er, he disobeyed his father’s orders to stay
away from the snowmobile. Mr. Fuller had
emptied the gas tank so Clay had to try to
siphon some from the car with a garden
hose and ended up swallowing a mouthful.
Mr. Fuller had no sympathy. Later that day,
when Clay tried to bow out of a guitar les-
son, he hollered: “You’re going and if you
don’t, I’m going to follow you around with
a lighter.”
In 2008, Mr. Fuller turned control of the
company over to all four sons. He re-
mained chairman, kept an office at the
Earls headquarters in downtown Vancouv-
er and often weighed in on important busi-
ness decisions – sometimes sticking his
nose in if he felt the customers were being
wronged. A week before he died, he called
his boys over to one Vancouver restaurant
location, demanding to know why the staff
were using the prime parking spots.
Most of his time, however, was spent
fishing, golfing and travelling. He re-
mained spry and healthy up until the end,
hiking and humping up rivers in Argentina
and Patagonia.
Six weeks ago, Mr. Fuller was diagnosed
with lung cancer. He had just begun treat-
ment and developed a blood clot, which
led to hypoxia. He died in his sleep in West
Vancouver on Oct. 5. Mr. Fuller leaves his
brother, Jack, four sons, 12 grandchildren
and extended family. A private ceremony
will be held for close friends and family.SpecialtoTheGlobeandMailBusFullerchangedthewayCanadiansdineout
ALEXANDRAGILLVANCOUVER
LeroyEarl(Bus)Fuller| NEWS