In testimony heard today,   Rob Whitwham, who was Director of Administrative Services at the time of the Heller report, testified he was shocked and angry when he saw the report on the CBC’s website.

Whitwham was one of the subjects in the report, and while the investigation into complaints by two city employees concluded the complaints against him and Anne Bailey were unfounded, he says the release of the document has   had an impact. “It impacted me on several levels, professionally, because I am bound by the community charter provisions which prevent me from discussing anything that was discussed in a closed meeting of Council,   when Anne Bailey was being criticized ( in the media) I could not stand up for her. I wondered how other employees perceived me because I was not standing up for Anne. I attended the Union of B.C. Municipalities convention in September and a former colleague came up to me and said ‘Hey, you were involved in that Chambers affair, how could you let that happen?’ It was said loud enough others could hear, so I wondered how I was being viewed by my colleagues in the province. Personally, the media coverage, in particular the daily newspaper, characterized me on at least 9 occasions, 10 counting this morning, where Kitty Heller had been scolding me , pointing fingers at me , or criticized me. Not once did that outlet report the complaints against me were unfounded, not until Kathleen Soltis’s testimony at this trial.”

Whitwham says the City has suffered because it has lost Anne Bailey, who left her job of 19 years and moved to the lower mainland largely in part because of the Heller report release “The City has suffered a big loss, Anne Bailey was an excellent employee and did great work She and her staff developed the protocols at the local detachment which have now been adopted by many other detachments and we no longer have that resource.”

When Defence suggested Whitwham was also embarrassed when the report was leaked because it made him look bad, Whitwham responded “I testified I was angry.” He would give that response twice more as Defence pushed twice more the prospect that the report was embarrassing to Whitwham.

Earlier in the day, Councillor Munoz proved she was unshakeable as she came under fire from Defence. Munoz had testified that Skakun had come to her place of work and confessed that he had leaked the Kitty Heller report and that he felt awful about what he had done, that he felt like dying. Lawyer Jon Duncan accused her of making up the story about Brian Skakun saying he felt like dying, because she resented Skakun over his political success, a bitter break up ( Munoz and Skakun once lived together) and had not been invited to his wedding. 

Munoz did not waiver.