RCMP still required to pay legal bills for unfairly tased trucker, despite his threatening emails to legal team

The RCMP will still pay the legal bills of an unfairly tased trucker, despite his threats to those involved in the court proceedings, a Supreme Court has ruled. 

Truck driver Bradley Martin Degen was awarded $317,000 by a British Columbia judge back in 2023 after it was determined he had been unfairly tased by two RCMP officers. The officers had woken him up as he was sleeping in his truck while parked at a lumber yard. When Degen refused to come out of his rig and went back to bed, the officer smashed his windows and tased him. 

According to InfoNews, as Degen was suing the RCMP, he was also sending threatening emails to two witnesses and three others involved in the suit’s court proceedings. Six months after he won the suit, he was jailed for these threats. 

“The sentencing judge concluded that the appropriate sentence was one year in jail on each of the counts, to be served consecutively, but he reduced each of those sentences to nine months based on the totality principle.  With credit for time served, (Degen) was required to serve a further 483 days in jail,” the decision reads.

Then in 2025, the RCMP disputed their responsibility to pay for Degen’s legal bills related to the suit, citing his threats as reason. During these proceedings, Degen once again began threatening those involved in the proceedings. 

“These emails generally had to do with remarks about the corrupt legal system and its corrupt participants, but they also referred to ‘friends’ of his and his family who know where most of the people involved in this case reside and who have said they will ‘dispense with some justice on those involved in due time,’” the Justice said.

On December 11th, the Supreme Court Justice ruled that the RCMP is still responsible for the legal bills related to the $300,000 suit, stating that Degen has already been punished for his threats during the trial through his jail time. 

“One cannot overstate the seriousness of this behaviour: this was outrageous misconduct of the worst and most extreme kind. It was behaviour that sought to strike at the core of the justice system. It was misconduct that deserves – indeed, requires – both severe rebuke and harsh sanction,” the Justice says. 

“(He) spent a significant time in jail.  He was also ordered to complete periods of probation of 18 months and three years, respectively, with the latter order also involving curfew restrictions and electronic monitoring for 18 months of that probation period,” the Justice says.

However, the Justice also ruled that Degen will be required to pay for his own legal bills related to current proceedings as a result of his threatening behavior.