Homophobic Fraser Valley farmer who rolled tractor while fleeing police has first appearance in court [with video]
Malkiat "Bill" Shoker who was involved in a slow-motion police chase as part of a convoy of bigots protesting LGBTQ anti-bullying materials on Nov. 25, 2023 was due in provincial court in Surrey on Jan. 16, 2025 to face numerous criminal charges.
Shoker turned himself in to police in Chillliwack on Dec. 18, 2024, beside his lawyer Paul Dutt after being charged on Dec. 9 with dangerous driving, assaulting a peace officer with a weapon, and flight from police for his comically karmic drive where he rolled his John Deere tractor on a Highway 1 on-ramp in Surrey trying to escape from police.
A video of Chilliwack farmer Bill Shoker fleeing from police on a roadway in Surrey on Nov. 23, 2023 as part of an anti-SOGI convoy and rolling the vehicle. (Facebook)
Shoker was leading a convoy of anti-SOGI (essentially anti-LGBTQ) protesters from Chilliwack to somewhere in Surrey or Vancouver. On an on-ramp in Surrey while fleeing officers attempting to pull him over, Shoker apparently lost control and rolled the tractor.
While Shoker turned himself in to the Chilliwack RCMP detachment, the charges he faces are in Surrey. His lawyer Paul Dutt was with him on Dec. 18 to grandstand about freedom of expression, although I was not there.
"We are not only dealing with criminal charges, which we will vigorously defend, we are also dealing with an individual's right for freedom of speech," Dutt is quoted as saying in The Progress on Dec. 18, 2024.
What fleeing from police while driving illegally and dangerously down roadways in the Fraser Valley and assaulting officers with a weapon has to do with freedom of expression is a mystery to me, if an unsurprising stretch of reality from a clever defence lawyer.
"Whether you're on either side of this, for Mr. Shoker he's on one side of it, but the main factor is that he was still protesting peacefully in his tractor, and he was able to do so, and he should be able to do so under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms," Dutt said.
Shoker runs Shoker Farms, a Chilliwack grower and farmgate seller of berries. Several people have separately declared boycotts against Shoker's products sold in stands around the community and directly from his main location across from the dump at 46825 Bailey Rd.
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Paul J. Henderson
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