Sergeant found not guilty of assaulting military police officers who removed her from 17 Wing

A Royal Canadian Air Force sergeant who refused to leave a restricted area of Winnipeg's 17 Wing has been found not guilty of assaulting the military police officers who had removed her from the base using what a martial court ruled involved the use of excessive force.

Sgt. Athena Morris intended to bring attention to important issue but showed lack of judgment, judge ruled

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A Royal Canadian Air Force sergeant who refused to leave a restricted area of Winnipeg's 17 Wing has been found not guilty of assaulting the military police officers who had removed her from the base using what a martial court ruled involved the use of excessive force.

However, Sgt. Athena Morris has been ordered to pay a fine for unlawfully entering the space to conduct a "peaceful protest" that required police intervention.

"Your intent was to bring attention to an important issue that affected you personally," military Judge Col. Stephen Strickey said Monday before a court martial held at HMCS Chippawa, a Royal Canadian Navy reserve division in Winnipeg.

"However, as a senior non-commissioned member of the CAF with 20 years of service … this was a regrettable lack of judgment on your part."

Court has heard that Morris jumped over a service counter and, using a scarf, tied herself to a chair in an administrative space that was off-limits to the public, known as the orderly room, after she was denied a request to change her gender marker on the Canadian Armed Forces' national human resources records system on March 31, 2025.

Three military police officers repeatedly asked her to leave, but Morris said she wouldn't do it until her information was updated, according to an agreed statement of circumstances read Monday. 

The officers handcuffed Morris and placed her in the back of a cruiser where she was shocked with an energy conductive weapon. She was charged with assaulting a police officer and with resisting or escaping from arrest or custody.

Police conduct doesn't excuse sergeant's actions: prosecutor

Morris filed an application alleging her Charter rights were infringed during the arrest. The court found the military police had used excessive force and failed to provide reasonable assistance to facilitate her access to counsel while she was in hospital.

The court determined a sentence reduction was the "appropriate remedy" in light of the Charter breaches.

Maj. Laurent Carignan told court the prosecution accepted the ruling and on Monday they didn't present evidence on the three separate counts Morris initially faced for allegedly assaulting a police officer — so she was found not guilty.

The Charter violation was also an "essential component" to a joint recommendation by the prosecution and defence to sentence Morris to a $2,000 fine, Carignan said.

Morris pleaded guilty to entering a restricted administrative workspace on the base without authorization and refusing to leave until she was removed. Under the National Defence Act, the offence could carry a maximum punishment of dismissal from the Canadian Armed Forces with disgrace, according to the judge.

Carignan said Morris's misconduct does not excuse the "unconstitutional conduct" of the military police, but it also doesn't erase the seriousness of her actions.

"Her chosen conduct was serious," Carignan told court. "The prosecution recognizes the administrative issue was important and deeply personal to her. But its importance did not authorize her to enter a restricted workplace and remain there until she was forcibly removed."

'Ongoing pattern of discrimination': Morris

Morris told the court martial the events leading up to her arrest didn't occur in isolation, but against a broader backdrop of ongoing disputes concerning her gender identity transition within the Armed Forces.

The sergeant said she had been ordered to stop using the women's washroom and instead use the men's shower facility. Morris said the CAF declined to update her email address with her preferred name and when she went to the orderly room to have her gender marker corrected, it had already been at least four months of attempting to get it changed.

"I understood it in the context of what I had already experienced … an ongoing pattern of discrimination," she told court.

The issues continued following her arrest, Morris said. She was misgendered and called by her dead name in written communication, even after providing legal documentation with her new name, she said.

"What has caused much of the lasting harm has been the experience of identifying a problem, explaining why it was discriminatory or harmful, and then finding that the institutions or individuals involved were unwilling to reconsider their position," Morris said.

Defence counsel Maj. Carlos Da Cruz told court Morris's actions were not a random act of indiscipline, but an incident born of sheer exhaustion and desperation — without violence or threat of it.

"She was backed into a corner by a failure at the very institution tasked with assisting her," he said. "Her moral blameworthiness must be heavily mitigated by the fact that she was reacting to a persistent systemic failure to respect her human dignity."

Da Cruz said Morris has an otherwise clean record, filled with military accomplishments, and she did not consider the impact her actions had on the operations at the administrative space. 

• Sergeant tied herself to chair at Winnipeg's air force base after bid to change gender in records denied

But the prosecution argued Morris's behavior already had a "significant sustained negative impacts" on operations across multiple units — resorting to new protocols such as installing physical barriers and alarm systems in customer service areas.

"Military service demands self-discipline, emotional control, some judgment and professional conflict resolution. On this occasion, Sgt. Morris did not demonstrate those qualities," Naurent said. 

Strickey said he agrees that a CAF member cannot respond in the way Morris did to an administrative area, regardless of the issue's importance.

The judge also said the focus on the sentence should be placed to deter other offenders from committing similar acts and acknowledged the harm done to the community. 

"A fine of $2,000 would represent a meaningful sanction," Strickey's decision said.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Santiago Arias Orozco is a journalist with CBC Manitoba currently based in Winnipeg. He previously worked for CBC Toronto and the Toronto Star. You can reach him at santiago.arias.orozco@cbc.ca.