An Oliver mom who was filmed in the height of the pandemic shouting racial verbal abuse at high school students last year will not be paying a fine for her actions.
The $2,300 fine and ticket against Silke Schulz was dropped on Oct. 17.
Court records show a stay of proceedings in the case against Schulz over a violation of the Access to Services Act for the incident outside the Southern Okanagan Secondary School in Oliver in February 2022.
After launching a challenge to the ticket, Schulze had been scheduled to go to trial on Oct. 18.
Spokesperson for the B.C. Prosecution Service Dan McLaughlin confirmed the stay in an email on Oct. 18.
“Crown Counsel with conduct of the file had come to the assessment that the charge assessment standard for proceeding with the charge could no longer be met,” McLaughlin said.
The prosecution service applies a two-part test both before charges are approved and during prosecution, where they weigh both the likelihood of getting a conviction and the public interest in launching court proceedings.
The likelihood requires the odds of a successful conviction being more likely than a conviction, and looks at the evidence that will be brought to bear.
The incident was recorded and shared in a video online that went viral, with Schulze seen and heard directing racist abuse at an Indo-Canadian student among other comments.
READ MORE: VIDEO: RCMP investigating racist abuse hurled at Oliver students during protest
A protest by supporters of the “Freedom Convoy” took place outside the Southern Okanagan Secondary School on Feb. 11, 2022. At the time, Schulze went onto school grounds where she was caught on camera verbally abusing the student.
The Access to Services Act was passed in November of 2021 and explicitly set out 20-meter protected bubbles around facilities such as schools and hospitals, making it a crime to “intimidate or attempt to intimidate an individual or otherwise do or say anything that could reasonably be expected to cause an individual concern for the individual’s physical or mental safety.”
A statement from RCMP at the time had said that the protesters were informed by a constable to stay off school grounds, and that the video was believed to have been taken after the constable had left.
Schulze later wrote an apology letter after she was identified by her distinctive tattoos, which was sent to other media in the region where she claimed that she never meant any harm and that she wasn’t a racist.
After the fine was issued, Schulze appeared in court in June of 2022 to challenge it.
