Former Drumheller Town Councillor Karen MacKinnon has been found guilty of breaching an order by the court for not tempering her tone on social media.
      MacKinnon was charged in 2011 with defamatory libel. She has made comment towards a Senior Town of Drumheller employee and the Town’s legal council. These charges were stayed in October of 2012 after she entered into a common peace bond with a number of conditions. While the order allowed her to use social media during the term of the order, future postings in relation to the named in the order shall be “ civil and temperate.”
She returned court in early 2014 charged with breaching this order.
      On Friday, December 18, Judge L.W. Robertson found her guilty in a written decision.
     A statement of facts, agreed to by the crown and MacKinnon stated that her comments were made on social media, theses comments were about the two individuals named and that they were not civil or temperate.
     MacKinnon elected to call no evidence in the trial and while she did file a notice to present a notice of a constitutional argument, when she was given opportunity to take the stand on her own behalf, she declined.
Judge Robertson found her guilty of the breach.
 MacKinnon is scheduled to return to court on January 15 to speak to setting a sentencing date.

    Morrin School’s Students Against Drinking & Driving (SADD) Chapter took time out to drive home the message of how important it is to make good decisions before getting behind the wheel.
    On Friday, December 11, 2015 the SADD Chapter held their fifth annual “White Out Day” event.
    “White Out Day” is an event that is meant to provide a visual representation of just how many people are lost to drinking and driving throughout the course of a day.
    In North America, one life is lost every 23 minutes due to impaired driving (roughly 3 per hour).
    Students in Grades 7-12 volunteered to have their names put into a random draw to be selected to represent actual victims of impaired driving from all over North America. Throughout the course of the day, students were randomly selected every 23 minutes and their faces were painted white.
    As the event drew to a close, 16 teachers and students represented lives lost to impaired driving.
    At the end of the day, students and staff were called into the gym to watch a video from SADD Alberta and to listen to the stories of the victims whom the randomly chosen “victims” were representing. 16 lives were lost, and they each had a different story to tell.
    Students and staff also heard from Staff Sergeant Grant MacDonald, who spoke to the importance of raising impaired driving awareness in our communities, especially during the holiday season.