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Bob Mackin

FIFA chose to reveal the 2026 men’s World Cup schedule on Feb. 4, the Sunday between the National Football League conference championships and Super Bowl LVIII, clashing with the early stages of the Pro Bowl Games telecast. 

A marketing expert said after the May 2023 unveiling of the FIFA World Cup 26 logo that soccer’s governing body was aiming to compete head-to-head with the NFL for fans and sponsors.

FIFA’s 2026 World Cup logo (FIFA)

“These guys clearly have aspirations,” said Lindsay Meredith, professor emeritus of marketing with Simon Fraser University. “Frankly, they’re in a good position to pull it off, which is basically to supplant Super Bowl as the superpower sporting event.”

The FIFA 26 logo contains the gold trophy awarded every four years to soccer’s world champion. Compare with the logo for the National Football League’s marquee annual event, which features the silver Vince Lombardi Trophy and Roman numerals denoting the championship number.

FIFA estimated a global viewing audience of 1.5 billion for the 2022 World Cup final between Argentina and France in Qatar, including nearly 26 million in the U.S. Super Bowl LVII drew more than 115 million viewers in the U.S. and reached another 40 million around the world.

Mexico hosted the 1970 and 1986 World Cups, while the U.S. played host in 1994. Canada’s biggest previous FIFA event was the 2015 Women’s World Cup, which ended at B.C. Place. 

Canada will play in its third World Cup, after qualifying for Mexico 1986 and Qatar 2022. 

Vancouver’s seven matches between June 13 and July 7, 2026 mean the B.C. Lions will have to start their Canadian Football League season on the road. But there are numerous other unknowns about the tournament. 

  • Where will all the VIPs, sponsors, reporters and ticket holders stay? 

Metro Vancouver has a hotel shortage, with little time to build new ones or convert empty office buildings to hotel use. Meanwhile, provincial restrictions are coming for short-term rentals. So cruise ships might be the best plan B.

  • How much will tickets cost? 

For Qatar 2022, opening round matches ranged from US$69 to US$220. Vancouver will also host a FIFA Fan Festival big screen public watch party for all matches, tentatively set for Hastings Park. The $103.7 million, 10,000-seat PNE Amphitheatre is scheduled to open in late spring 2026. 

  • What is the total bill for taxpayers? 

Officially, City of Vancouver is on the hook for $230 million. The provincial government gave city hall authority to collect a 2.5 percent tax on accommodations until 2030. 

B.C. Pavilion Corp, which manages B.C. Place Stadium, has not announced its budget for a laundry list of upgrades, from two temporary grass pitches to new elevators to a souvenir store and press box. But it will be in the tens of millions of dollars. 

The federal government has not announced its contribution, which will include security. Vancouverites who remember the $1 billion price tag to keep the 2010 Winter Olympics safe might brace for sticker shock. 

Secrecy abounds. FIFA is resisting disclosure of its host city contract with Vancouver. Seattle city council released its agreement last summer. It says Seattle is responsible for supporting the government to provide safety, security, fire protection and medical services at no cost to FIFA, plus free public transportation to ticketholders on match days, and to anyone accredited by FIFA throughout the competition period. Unless otherwise explicitly stated, the host city authority shall be responsible to bear all the costs of hosting and waive all claims of liability against FIFA, its officials and related entities.

  • Is there an economic benefit? 

Undoubtedly, a bonanza for some businesses. But definitely not for all. 

The province estimates it will generate more than $1 billion for the tourism industry during 2026 and for the five years after the tournament.

A study on local, regional and national economic impacts of mega events by Victor Matheson, an economics professor at the College of the Holy Cross in Massachusetts, found that many large sporting events “simply supplant, rather than supplement the regular tourist economy.”

“In other words, the economic impact of a mega-event may be large in a gross sense but the net impact may be small,” Matheson concluded.

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Bob Mackin FIFA chose to reveal the 2026

Bob Mackin 

Mark Saturday, June 13, 2026 on your calendar, for the first of seven FIFA World Cup 26 matches at B.C. Place Stadium. 

FIFA announced the match schedule for the next men’s World Cup during a live broadcast from Miami on Feb. 4.

FIFA’s 2026 World Cup logo for Vancouver (FIFA)

The Vancouver Whitecaps will make in way in 2026 for a grass pitch to be installed at B.C. Place for group stage matches on June 13, 18, 21, 24 and 26, a round of 32 knockout match on July 2 and a group of 16 elimination game on July 7. Canada will play in two of the group matches at B.C. Place, June 18 and 24.

Opponents will not be known for two years. Only three nations have qualified for the 48-nation tournament — from Canada, U.S. and Mexico. Most of the rest will be determined by November 2025, but final, wildcard berths will be set more than two years from now in March 2026. Likewise, the date for ticket sales is to be announced. 

The tournament kicks-off June 11, 2026 in Mexico City’s Azteca Stadium, site of the 1970 and 1986 World Cup finals. 

SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles will host the first match in the U.S. on June 12, 2026. 

When the U.S. hosted the World Cup for the first time in 1994, it ended with Brazil’s penalty kicks victory at the Rose Bowl. 

Toronto’s BMO Field, the smallest stadium in the tournament, hosts Canada’s opening match and an opponent to be determined on June 12, 2026. Another five matches, including a round of 32 match, are scheduled for the home of Toronto FC.

Seattle’s Lumen Field will host six matches, two of which will be in knockout rounds. 

Quarterfinals are going to Boston, Kansas City, Los Angeles and Miami, semifinals to Atlanta and Dallas and the bronze medal match in Miami.

New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium is the site of the July 19, 2026 championship final. 

The schedule announcement was co-hosted by Argentine-American play-by-play caller Andres “Goooooaaaaal” Cantor, American comedian Kevin Hart and American Fox Sports host Jenny Taft, with FIFA president Gianni Infantino. 

It also featured West Vancouverite Victor Montagliani, a FIFA vice-president, and Toronto rapper Drake.

The 104-match tournament will primarily take place in the U.S., which boasts the biggest, most-modern stadiums. Under the originally planned 80-match format, the 11 U.S. cities, including Seattle, were allotted 60 matches, Vancouver and Toronto were to split 10 matches and Mexico City, Monterrey and Guadalajara the other 10.

B.C. Place gets one more match than Toronto, because it has a higher capacity. Lumen Field has even more seats than B.C. Place, but it has only six matches.

Vancouver was not included in the winning three-country bid in 2018 after Premier John Horgan balked at giving FIFA a blank cheque and the tri-country bid organization refused to negotiate more favourable terms to B.C. 

Horgan changed his mind in 2021 when Montreal withdrew due to its concern over high costs for taxpayers.

City of Vancouver is responsible for the $230 million hosting budget. B.C. Place Stadium will undergo renovations, but the NDP government has not announced the budget. There will also be extra costs for security.

FIFA reported record gross revenue of US$7.6 billion for the 2019-to-2022 cycle and forecast US$11 billion for the 2023-to-2026 period. It relies on local markets to pay the costs for the World Cup.

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Bob Mackin  Mark Saturday, June 13, 2026 on

For the week of Feb. 4, 2024:

Thirty-six weeks until British Columbia’s next scheduled election and ResearchCo’s Mario Canseco has the pulse of voters. 

His first survey of the election year finds that Premier David Eby’s NDP would win re-election by a plurality, but John Rustad’s Conservatives could replace Kevin Falcon’s BC United as official opposition.

Mario Canseco goes in-depth on the top issues with host Bob Mackin on this edition of thePodcast.

Plus Pacific Rim and Pacific Northwest headlines. 

CLICK BELOW to listen or go to TuneIn, Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Google Podcasts.

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For the week of Feb. 4, 2024: Thirty-six

Bob Mackin

The BC NDP finished 2023 with almost $4.55 million in donations. 

Premier David Eby’s party out-raised opposition leader Kevin Falcon’s BC United, which counted $2.978 million in donations for the year.

According to Elections BC returns released Feb. 1, the NDP took in $1.89 million between Oct. 1 and Dec. 31, better than the BC United’s $1.178 million. The BC Greens reported $535,994.05 in the fourth quarter and Conservatives $299,820.20.

Premier David Eby and Mayor Ken Sim at Queen Elizabeth Park (@KenSimCity)

The NDP’s total exceeded 2022, when they took-in $4.01 million. BC United, who were the BC Liberals until last April, improved by $448,000 over the previous year’s $2.53 million. 

The Sonia Furstenau-led BC Greens, buoyed by a $535,994.05 fourth quarter, finished at $1.197 million, up from $1.075 million in 2022. 

But the big movers were John Rustad and the Conservatives. Their 2023 fourth quarter revenue was a whopping 1,802 percent better than the scant $15,732.16 from the same period in 2022. In fact, the Conservatives reported only $84,960.98 in donations for all of 2022 under previous leader Trevor Bolin. 

The 2023 ceiling on individual donations to each registered party, including candidates and constituency associations, was $1,401.40. The 2024 cap is $1,450.82.

The half-year, taxpayer-funded allowance payments, based on $1.75 per 2020 vote formula, were most recently paid Jan. 15: $813,037.52 to the NDP, $575,713.94 to BC United, $257,156.66 to the BC Greens and $32,491.31 to the Conservatives. 

The next instalment is July 15. 

Falcon hosted the Vancouver Leader’s Dinner at the Floata banquet hall in Chinatown on Jan. 31. Eby and his party are holding a fundraiser in Surrey on Feb. 4 at Aria.

The next scheduled election is Oct. 19.

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Bob Mackin The BC NDP finished 2023 with

Bob Mackin

The opponents of Israel’s war on Hamas who rallied outside Mayor Ken Sim’s house harmed their cause, said a University of B.C. sociology professor who analyzes protest movements.

“It’s not really fair game to do this with individuals in their family setting,” said David Tindall.

Anti-Israel protesters outside Mayor Ken Sim’s house on Sunday (Instagram/Samidounvan)

A video posted Tuesday to Instagram shows a group of protesters obscured by masks, hoods and traditional keffiyeh scarves marching on the morning of Jan. 28 to Sim’s Jericho-area neighbourhood.

They brought banners and flags, chanted slogans and tossed children’s toys and shoes splattered in red paint on the branches of a streetside tree. Late in the 82-second video, which said the protest took place for 20 to 25 minutes, someone off-camera shouted “they’re filming us” and another person said “cops are on scene.” Then the camera followed protesters jaywalking. 

The Instagram post said the protesters were inspired by a Jan. 13 rally outside the Montreal home of Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly. It also mentioned Sim was quick to condemn the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack on Israel and offer his support to the local Jewish community.

“In social movements, there’s always kind of more-radical groups and there’s kind of more-mainstream groups,” Tindall said. “There’s kind of a norm amongst mainstream groups, generally speaking, this isn’t really an acceptable sort of thing to do. In some ways, it’s in the same category as doxing individuals.”

The Office of the Mayor did not respond for comment.

Targeting politicians away from the workplace, including their home, is not a new tactic. In November 2013, anti-LNG protesters dressed in hardhats and high visibility vests erected a fake fracking rig on the lawn of then-premier Christy Clark’s Mount Pleasant home.

Sgt. Steve Addison, Vancouver Police Department public information officer, said nobody was arrested on Sunday. He said investigators in the Emergency Operations and Planning Section “gather intelligence about planned protests, conduct risk assessments, and communicate in advance with willing protest organizers to help facilitate a safe and peaceful environment for demonstrations.”

“We also work with individuals, businesses, and property representatives who are targets of protest activity to ensure everyone’s safety,” Addison said.

ABC Mayor Ken Sim (YouTube)

On Jan. 16, Vancouver Police said they incurred $2.5 million in overtime costs after 80 post-Oct. 7 protests and for investigating hate crimes sparked by the Israel-Hamas war. Of the 47 antisemitic hate incidents reported in 2023, 33 happened since Oct. 7. VPD said nine people had been charged and six more cases were under Crown counsel review.

Jakub Jerzy Markiewicz is facing charges of assault of a peace officer, assault causing bodily harm and wilfully resisting or obstructing a peace officer at a Nov. 14 anti-Israel protest against Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Markiewicz’s next appearance is Feb. 7 in Downtown Community Court.

In November, a Surrey city council meeting was cut short by pro-Palestine protesters. In January, a majority of NDP-aligned New Westminster city councillors voted to support a motion advocating ceasefire in Gaza. Mayor Patrick Johnstone was absent and two members of the opposition New West Progressives abstained, expressing sympathy for those affected but arguing the council has no control over Canada’s foreign policy. 

Tindall expects the protests to continue across North America and Europe, particularly because of the involvement of well-resourced labour and environmental groups and the U.S. Presidential campaign.

“This is a potential factor that could possibly lead Joe Biden to lose the election against Donald Trump, because a lot of young people are involved in these movements and are very upset with the Biden administration’s fairly strong support for Israel,” Tindall said. 

The group that posted the protest against Sim on Instagram is Samidoun, whose leaders have spoken in defence of Hamas and its Oct. 7 attack.

The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA), which represents Jewish federations across Canada, wants the Canadian government to follow the lead of Israel and Germany and ban Samidoun. CIJA’s website says Samidoun is related to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, which Ottawa declared a terrorist organization in 2003. 

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Bob Mackin The opponents of Israel’s war on

Bob Mackin

An aging West Point Grey mansion, which was the site of a U2 video shoot in 2015, is at the centre of a B.C. Supreme Court battle.

1611 Drummond Drive in Vancouver (Royal LePage)

In a Jan. 29 decision, Justice Jacqueline Hughes refused to dismiss plaintiff Han Wang’s lawsuit against 1611 Drummond Drive owner Donger Lu after the 2022 sale fell through. Last year, B.C. Assessment valued the 1.354 acre property — which contains an eight-bedroom, six-bathroom house built in 1925 — at $16.648 million.

Wang, who had agreed to pay $18.58 million, filed a certificate of pending litigation (CPL) and accused Lu of breach of contract. Lu countersued and unsuccessfully applied for cancellation of the CPL. She also failed to convince Hughes to order Wang to make a $2 million security payment to the court.

The judgment said that Wang is a Canadian citizen who moved to Vancouver from China in 2008 and is currently president of a Vancouver real estate development company. Lu moved to Canada in 2007 and is retired. She bought the property in 2013 along with her then-husband, Ding Yuan Hua, and it was transferred to her name in 2014, two years before they divorced.

Lu testified in the three-day, June 2023 hearing that an architect had been commissioned to plan a new house on the property and that she continued to call it her principal residence. It was listed for sale in November 2019 and then re-listed in 2020 and 2021. 

Despite trees falling and damaging the roof and windows, a June 2021 listing described the house as “immaculate and well-kept.” On the recommendation of an insurance company, however, Lu stayed at her son’s nearby house. 

Wang and real estate agent Charles Yang toured the house on several occasions in March 2022. Yang testified that he noticed a tarp on the roof, but Lu’s real estate agent told him that the roof was being repaired and that Lu was currently living there. Wang and Yang never met Lu, Hughes wrote.

“For his part, Mr. Wang testified that he observed the tarp on the roof, but it did not concern him because many of the houses in the neighbourhood were old, similarly had tarps and were undergoing repairs,” Hughes wrote. 

Almost two weeks after the first tour, Lu’s insurance broker told her no one was willing to insure the property, “other than one who was prepared to insure it as a vacant dwelling on a wreckage value basis due to its condition.”

Wang offered $18.58 million in April 2022 and agreed to pay a $900,000 deposit with a Sept. 29, 2022 closing date. But, in August of that year, he was unable to obtain inhabited dwelling insurance, which his lender required. 

“Upon making further inquiries, Mr. Wang eventually learned that the property was insured as a vacant property,” Hughes wrote. 

Wang asked Lu to extend the closing date to October, but she refused. 

“She testified that she did so because she had committed to providing funds for her son to purchase a property in China and to complete a lease agreement for the purchase of a property for herself in London, England in the amount of £2,830,200, which were both scheduled to complete shortly after the closing date under the contract,” Hughes wrote. 

A September inspection found structural problems and problems with the water and electrical systems. Wang learned that Lu had not lived there for some time and that her empty homes tax  (EHT) declarations were untrue. She did not provide a speculation and vacancy tax (SVT) declaration. 

The property was re-listed for sale in October, but the listing did not mention the house.

“Mr. Wang asserts that he remains ready, willing and able to purchase the property and intends to do so once it has been remediated to the point where it can be insured as an inhabited dwelling and when Ms. Lu has complied with the EHT and SVT terms of the contract.”

Lu wanted the certificate of pending litigation removed on the basis of her financial hardship.  She took a $5.5 million loan through Amber Mortgage Corporation in October 2022 to fund the overseas property acquisitions, secured against the Drummond property and a commercial property near Metrotown. But the judge said she did not disclose complete tax records and provided no evidence about how she funds her daily living expenses or the costs of maintaining her property. Additionally, the supporting documentation about her overseas purchases was in Chinese and not translated to English, as required by court rules.

“Given Ms. Lu’s multiple property purchases and opaque financial circumstances, I am unable to conclude that the interest being paid by Ms. Lu and the hardship she alleges she is experiencing by consequence thereof, results solely from the registration of the CPL,” Hughes wrote.

The judge awarded costs to Wang. 

In April 2015, a Los Angeles production company quietly rented the house for a two-day shoot with U2 between the band’s rehearsals for the Vancouver-launched iNNOCENCE + eXPERIENCE tour. Resident Jason Upton told a reporter that he spotted drummer Larry Mullen Jr. inside and heard unfamiliar songs. Upton also said the crew rolled a red carpet on the wood floor of the classic dining room, where a small stage had been built for a previous film production, and the white ceiling was temporarily painted red. 

A planned behind-the-scenes documentary on the album and tour for later that year was postponed. 

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Bob Mackin An aging West Point Grey mansion,

Bob Mackin 

The vice-president of the Alliance of Iranian Canadians said charges against three men announced Monday by a U.S. court confirm long-held beliefs about the Iranian government’s  foreign interference operations, but it “maximizes the amount of terror people feel.”

Ram Joubin (Joubin Law)

“A lot of people in the Iranian community or intelligence might know that the regime uses proxies, but now we have the proof and that’s very significant,” said Ram Joubin, who is a lawyer in Burnaby. “There’s many things we can learn from this, the use of proxies, how savvy this could be. They’re hiding behind a professional.”

The unsealed indictment from a grand jury in the U.S. District Court for Minnesota charged 49-year-old Naji Sharifi Zindashti, an Iranian drug lord who collaborates with Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MIOS), and Canadians Damion Patrick John Ryan, 43, and Adam Richard Pearson, 29. The U.S. alleges Zindashti hired full-patch Hells Angel Ryan who then hired Pearson as part of a $370,000 murder-for-hire scheme targeting two unnamed Maryland residents. 

Ryan and Pearson are in custody on unrelated charges. Zindashti is in Iran. The indictment said they communicated on encrypted smartphones from Vancouver’s Sky Global. The FBI shut down the company and charged its CEO and top distributor with racketeering in March 2021. 

The charges announced Monday coincided with the first day of public hearings for the year-long Public Inquiry into Foreign Interference in Federal Electoral Processes and Democratic Institutions. Commissioner Marie-Josee Hogue is focusing on China, Russia and India, but Joubin hopes Canadians will learn more about how Iran meddles in Canadian politics. 

“We don’t hear a lot about Iran and foreign interference, we hear mostly about other countries,” he said. “More recently, Iran and India have come a little bit more into the mainstream, the news cycle, but really, we’re just scratching the surface of the Iranian influence in Canada.”

Nando De Luca, a lawyer for the Conservative Party, made a formal submission Tuesday to Hogue, asking that the commission also investigate “the Iranian regime and its campaign of intimidation, repression and interference.” De Luca said the Liberal government had not “taken any appropriate action” on Iranian foreign interference. 

Joubin is part of a group that has identified more than 700 people living in Canada who are linked to the Iranian regime. Many of them are involved in money laundering, embezzlement or other security threats. 

Naji Sharifi Zindashti (FBI)

“The [federal government’s] rhetoric in the last year has been ‘oh, we already did everything we should have, we already imposed the sanctions’,” Joubin said. “It’s proven over and over that the sanctions didn’t work, because we get all these people being found in Canada who have a high profile. So how did they get in?”

The Canadian government has sanctioned 248 Iranian entities, including the MIOS, and 194 individuals. The recently released list of Named Research Organizations includes 12 Iranian institutions that are not to receive Canadian funding due to national security risks. 

Unlike the U.S., Canada has not declared the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) a terrorist organization. The U.S. National Counterterrorism Center describes the IRGC as the “Iranian state’s armed force charged with defending Iran’s revolutionary regime” and is separate from the conventional military force. Canada did, in 2012, list the IRGC Qods Force, the external operations branch of the central command, which assists other terrorists like Hamas, Hezbollah, Taliban and Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. 

Joubin said the solutions need to be forward-looking and that could include stronger immigration legislation. He said nothing is safe from Iranian government infiltration, even mosques, and other countries have been more aggressive in countering transnational repression. Last November, authorities in Germany raided 54 locations related to the Islamic Center Hamburg.

Hogue faces a May deadline for her interim report and end of year for the commission’s final report. In her opening statement, she said her goal is to “uncover the truth, wherever it may be.”

“I will make every effort to get to the bottom of things and understand what the country has faced and what it may still be facing in terms of foreign interference,” Hogue said. “Foreign interference in our democratic institutions is a very serious issue. It requires us to investigate, analyze and reflect as thoroughly as possible in order to ultimately identify the best ways to counter it. Or, if it’s not possible to prevent it entirely, to limit its effects.”

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Bob Mackin  The vice-president of the Alliance of

Bob Mackin

An employee of the company that managed the Winters Hotel said he did not know if there ever was a fire drill at the Gastown single-room occupancy hotel. 

Chauncey Carr, the director of supportive housing programs and tenant relations for Atira Property Management, testified Jan. 30 in Burnaby at the Coroner’s Inquest in the deaths of tenants Mary Ann Garlow, 63, and Dennis James Guay, 53. Their bodies were found in the rubble, after the devastating April 11, 2022 blaze.

B.C. Coroners Service

“In hindsight, I didn’t realize how dangerous the Winters was, it’s a 113-year-old building,” Carr testified. “By modern standards, I don’t know if those plans would have ever been approved with the open atrium style, with the building materials that were used. It was an old fire panel system.”

Carr said that he would take a weekly walk through the building and check fire extinguishers. 

“The only thing that ever really caught my eye was the breakaway glass not being on the extinguisher cases, but there was no other fire safety stuff that really caused any alarm bells for myself,” he said. 

Carr said break-ins, including people climbing through fire escape doors, and hoarding in rooms were issues. He said would only look inside a room if a door was open, because he was focused on common areas. 

Several months before April 2022, building management had closed fire escape doors with chains in order to prevent break-ins, but he saw to it that the chains were removed.

Carr said he did not recall any evacuation instructions being posted inside rooms and the only “tools” to deal with fire hazards inside units were do not occupy orders and eviction notices.

“We often would just try to work with residents if hoarding got particularly bad, then we can call the fire department for a DNO [do not occupy], but that was kind of an option of last resort.”

Carr was called to the Winters on April 8, 2022 after a fire. He arrived as fire crews were leaving and was given a copy of a notice of violation. He gave it to building manager Gina Vanemberg. Vancouver Fire and Rescue Services (VFRS) ordered management to immediately hire a qualified technician to service the fire alarm and sprinkler and provide 24-hour fire watch until the system could be reset and fully functional. 

“I helped her find other rooms for residents. She called in the restoration company and I told her to call the fire safety company to reset the panel and refill the sprinklers,” Carr testified. 

On the morning of April 11, 2022, Carr was called to the Winters because of another fire. This time, it was out of control.

“I was basically in a panic, I tried to go inside to help evacuate the building, but the fire department didn’t let me,” Carr testified. “So I started working with my colleagues and finding a place for people who had to be evacuated to go to and to find everyone from the building.”

He was asked if Atira had a system in place in case of a mass-evacuation, such as a roll call. 

“I don’t know,” he said. 

Despite the VFRS order, the sprinklers were not working when unattended candles caused the fire that engulfed the building. 

The inquest, before Presiding Coroner John Knox and a jury, continues Wednesday. The job of the coroner’s jury is to find facts, not fault, and make recommendations to help prevent a similar tragedy. 

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Bob Mackin An employee of the company that

Bob Mackin 

A U.S. grand jury indictment unsealed Jan. 29 alleges a full-patch Hells Angel from B.C. used a defunct Vancouver company’s encrypted phone service to plot murders for a drug lord connected to the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security.

Damion Patrick Ryan (VPD)

Damion Patrick John Ryan, 43, is charged, along with fellow Canadian Adam Richard Pearson, 29, and Iranian Naji Sharifi Zindashti, 49, for conspiracy to use interstate commerce in the commission of a murder-for-hire plot between December 2020 and March 2021.

The three men were also sanctioned Monday by the U.S. Office of Foreign Assets Control. 

The U.S. District Court filing said the trio and an Iran-based co-conspirator used the end-to-end encrypted Sky ECC mobile communications service to share photographs of the victims and maps identifying their locations. They also allegedly used the clandestine platform to recruit personnel to assist in the killings, discuss logistics of the murders and negotiate payment for associated expenses. 

U.S. authorities shut down SkyECC and its Vancouver parent company, SkyGlobal, in March 2021 and charged two men with racketeering conspiracy and conspiracy to distribute controlled substances. 

According to the indictment, Ryan and Zindashti communicated in December 2020 and January 2021 about various topics. The co-conspirator tasked Ryan to form a team of gunmen to travel to Maryland to commit the murders.

Ryan allegedly messaged Pearson on Sky ECC about a job in Maryland, telling him that he needed at least two, and likely three, people, including a driver. During negotiations about money, Pearson allegedly told Ryan that he would encourage recruits to “shoot [the victim] in the head a lot [to] make example.” 

The indictment said Zindashti and Ryan agreed to $350,000, plus $20,000 for travel expenses. The co-conspirator sent him photos of a man and woman and maps. In March 2021, the co-conspirator allegedly arranged a $20,000 payment to Ryan for travel expenses associated with the murder plot. 

All three are charged with conspiracy to use interstate commerce facilities in the commission of murder for hire. Pearson is also charged with possession of a firearm by a fugitive from justice and possession of a firearm by an alien unlawfully in the U.S. 

Ryan is already in custody after his February 2023 arrest in Ottawa on illegal firearms and ammunition possession and trafficking charges following a February 2022 raid of a home in Ottawa. 

Naji Sharifi Zindashti (FBI)

Ryan is a full patch member of a Hells Angels chapter in Greece, but also associated with the Wolfpack gang in B.C. One of the Wolfpack members, Rabih Alkhalil, escaped from the North Fraser Pretrial Centre in July 2022 while on trial for a 2012 murder. Alkhalil was convicted in absentia but remains at large. 

In May 2021, Vancouver Police Department included Ryan in their “top six” public warning poster. 

Ryan was the target of a failed April 2015 shooting in the food court at Vancouver International Airport. Hitman Knowah Ferguson had been promised $200,000, but was convicted of attempted murder and conspiracy and sentenced to 11 years. 

Ryan and Pearson were sanctioned by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, along with Iranians Nihat Abdulkadir Asan, Reza Hamidiravari, Ekrem Abdulkerym Oztunc and Shahram Ali Reza Tamarzadeh Zavieh Jakki.

Hamidiravari was identified as an officer in the Ministry of Intelligence and Security who oversees Zindashti’s MOIS-directed operations. 

SkyECC was marketed by Vancouver-based SkyGlobal as a protected method to share secure audio messages and images and self-destructing messages. But U.S. authorities in San Diego charged West Vancouverite CEO Jean-Francois Eap and distributor Thomas Herdman in March 2021 with conspiracy to violate the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act for selling encrypted phones to transnational drug criminals. SkyGlobal and its SkyECC service were immediately shut down, but the case against Eap and Herdman has yet to be tried. 

Eap said in March 2021 that he did not condone illegal activity and said he would work to clear his name. 

During the fall trial of disgraced former RCMP civilian intelligence officer Cameron Ortis, Eap was identified as an associate of Vincent Ramos. Ramos was CEO of Richmond’s Phantom Secure, which sold encrypted BlackBerry smartphones to criminals. Ramos was arrested in 2018, convicted in 2019 and sentenced to nine years in a U.S. prison. 

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Bob Mackin  A U.S. grand jury indictment unsealed

For the week of Jan. 28, 2024:

One year down, two to go, for British Columbia’s hard drug decriminalization experiment. 

A Simon Fraser University clinical psychologist is not surprised that the death toll from toxic drug overdoses in B.C. hit a record 2,511 in 2023. 

Dr. Julian Somers of the Centre for Applied Research in Mental Health and Addiction predicted a year go that the public health emergency would worsen. 

“We’ve been spending more incrementally each year,” Somers said. “The things we’re spending on — pharmaceuticals and hospital beds, buildings where people are congregated together with consumption sites — those have been shown empirically not to result in meaningful change. So it’s more than a theoretical prediction. The evidence indicates that that’s not the way to get out of this crisis.”

Somers is Bob Mackin’s guest on this edition of thePodcast.

Plus Pacific Rim and Pacific Northwest headlines. 

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