David Wallace and James Di Fiore posted videos online last year where they mocked, maligned and made allegations without supporting evidence about people connected to the health care procurement controversy at Alberta Health Services.Jeff McIntosh/The Canadian Press
A judge has ruled that it was appropriate to authorize the search of the computers and phones of two podcasters who, he said, waged a “no-holds-barred” campaign to harass and intimidate a potential witness in a lawsuit against the Alberta government.
In a decision released Friday, Justice Michael Lema of the Court of King’s Bench wrote that Calgary investment banker Sandy Edmonstone was justified when he sought to obtain the records of the podcasters after they began targeting him.
For several months last year, David Wallace and James Di Fiore posted videos online where they mocked, maligned and made allegations without supporting evidence about people connected to the health care procurement controversy at Alberta Health Services.
Mr. Edmonstone was a member of the board of AHS at the time when the government of Premier Danielle Smith fired the health authority’s CEO, Athana Mentzelopoulos, in January, 2025.
The Alberta health care procurement controversy, explained
Ms. Mentzelopoulos alleged in a wrongful-dismissal suit that the government sacked her after she wouldn’t shut down an internal probe into the way AHS awarded contracts to certain private vendors. The government said it ousted her for failing to implement its agenda.
She said Mr. Edmonstone supported her and that she intended to call him as a witness.
The RCMP and the province’s Auditor-General are now investigating the procurement allegations. Mounties executed several search warrants in connection with their investigation last March.
After being repeatedly targeted in the podcasts of Mr. Wallace and Mr. Di Fiore, Mr. Edmonstone obtained an extraordinary legal remedy from Justice Lema last November, a court order authorizing a search at the homes of the two podcasters to find out who was directing them.
Armed with the court order, independent solicitors and bailiffs showed up at their homes on Dec. 16 and made copies of their electronic files.
The two podcasters have since filed an application to revoke the seizure order and bar Mr. Edmonstone from accessing their records. Justice Lema’s judgment rejected that bid.
Mr. Wallace at the United Conservative Party AGM in Edmonton in November, 2025.Amber Bracken/The Globe and Mail
In his ruling, Justice Lema said the men’s podcasts didn’t appear to have any other purpose but to make “threats of vexatious disclosures and, beyond that, increased pressure” on Mr. Edmonstone in order to have him reconsider testifying in the Mentzelopoulos litigation.
Justice Lema added that the podcasters made “false … unfounded and unfair” allegations about Mr. Edmonstone.
“This is a campaign. And apparently a no-holds-barred one,” the judge wrote, calling the podcasts a “vilification campaign.”
First, there was Alberta’s health procurement controversy. Then the surveillance began
Until Ms. Mentzelopoulos indicated in a court filing last June that she considered calling Mr. Edmonstone as a witness, there was no indication that the two podcasters had any interest in him, Justice Lema’s decision said, noting that “this out-of-the-blue character-assassination campaign” only began in August of 2025.
Mr. Wallace’s own remarks also undermined his effort to persuade the judge that he had no prior motives. On his podcasts, Mr. Wallace has mentioned that he worked previously as a political operative and said that he currently had employers paying him to scrutinize the AHS controversy.
In his ruling, the judge pointed at Mr. Wallace’s words. In an Oct. 22, 2025, podcast for example, Mr. Wallace said “I’m indemnified and empowered to go after everybody I want to,” although he never identified who was bankrolling him.
“This is Mr. Wallace trying to cast a noble sheen on what appears (on the existing record) to be a very unnoble exercise,” Justice Lema wrote.
The judge added that Mr. Wallace’s self-described profession as political fixer would be “seemingly implying a willingness to help people with political agendas accomplish their ends via unorthodox or unconventional means.”
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It was reasonable to authorize a search of the podcasters’ homes without giving them prior notice because there was a possibility that they would destroy or conceal documents if they had advance warning, the judge said.
“Mr. Wallace’s references to backers without identifying them signals a likely desire to shield their identities,” Justice Lema wrote.
Craig Alcock, the lawyer representing the two podcasters, had argued in court filings that their conduct wasn’t a form of intimidation since Mr. Edmonstone indicated that he still intended to appear as a witness in the lawsuit.
“That fact that one might be resolute and the other fearful does not change the essence of the intimidating words or actions,” Justice Lema wrote, adding that “even if the immediate target is not intimidated or deterred, other prospective witnesses in the proceeding who learn of the offside conduct might be reasonably deterred from participating.”
Justice Lema had also issued a restraining order against the podcasters. They argued that this limited their freedom of expression. However, the judge said his order only barred them from publishing content “that are harassing, defamatory, or intended or likely to intimidate” and that they weren’t restricted from talking about Mr. Edmonstone in other ways.
Ms. Mentzelopoulos has since applied to join Mr. Edmonstone’s court action and gain access to the podcasters’ records, saying that she was harassed by them in a similar fashion.
Mr. Alcock did not respond to a request for comment.