A small group of protesters remained at Winnipeg’s Brady Road landfill Saturday, despite an interim injunction preventing them from blocking the main road to the city-owned facility that went into effect at 6 p.m. CT Friday.
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!“There are people on the front lines that are ready if the police come,” said Melissa Morrisseau, who has been at Camp Morgan — a protest camp set up near the entrance of the Brady landfill — for more than a week.
“Not violence or anything or aggression, but ready to make a stand to get arrested if we have to.”
Camp Morgan has been in place for months near Brady Road in support of calls to search of the Prairie Green landfill, north of Winnipeg. Police believe the remains of two First Nations women who they say were homicide victims — Morgan Harris and Marcedes Myran — were taken to Prairie Green last year.
The main entrance to the city-owned Brady Road landfill was blockaded on July 6, in response to the provincial government’s decision that it would not support a search at Prairie Green.
On Friday, Manitoba Court of King’s Bench Justice Sheldon Lanchbery said while the protest is valid and protesters can remain at the site, the city must be allowed to operate the landfill and the roadway can no longer be blocked.
About a dozen people remained at the blockade on Saturday afternoon.
One of those people was Melissa Robinson, Harris’s cousin. She remained adamant that the landfill needs to be searched.
“I will not bend on searching the landfill. It needs to be done. Our women need to be brought home,” she told CBC on Saturday.
“It’s sad that we have to sit here in the rain, get rained on, and beg for our government to listen to us.”
Robinson said the group overall is in good spirits and encouraged more people to come down and support.
“Let’s show our city, let’s show our government that … we stand in solidarity.”
That support is something Tracy Fiddler, who was also at the blockade Saturday, thinks is lacking.
“You claim you support what’s going on with the missing and murdered women. Where are you?” Fiddler said.
“Come to the Brady landfill. Come support us. Come support your sisters that are missing.”
Morrisseau said it feels like at this point, only arrests at the site will bring awareness to the issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls, and bring justice for the families of victims.
“If police come, we don’t want a confrontation — we don’t want a confrontation with anybody,” she said.
“But … we take directives from the family. Whatever the family wants, that’s what we do.”
WATCH | Protest continues at Brady Road landfill on Friday after injunction delivered:
Protesters at Camp Morgan set fire to injunction order, refuse to leave Brady landfill
A police liaison officer speaks to protesters blocking the entrance at the Brady Road landfill in Winnipeg on Friday, July 14, 2023. The city served a court injunction to the group that evening, which gives police authority to arrest and remove people. Many at the site on Friday said they wouldn’t leave, as they set fire to the order.
People were out Saturday delivering food and water to protesters. Cars and trucks occasionally honked their horns in support.
Protesters have said they intend to remain peaceful, but also say they are determined to see a search of the Prairie Green landfill.
For Long Plain First Nation Chief Kyra Wilson, protesters aren’t leaving until that search happens.
“Even though we don’t know what the outcome is, we still have to at least try,” she told CBC National News on Saturday.
The Winnipeg Police Service has not said whether they intend to enforce the court injunction this weekend.
“We do not typically provide information regarding police operational plans,” Const. Dani McKinnon said on Friday.
