A Vernon man who had front-row seats to a historic gathering of protesters outside Parliament in downtown Ottawa says he would do it all again.
Jeff Gaudry had been at the Ottawa Freedom Convoy protest for three weeks.
The Vernon trucker left just a day before Ottawa Police dispersed the last of the holdouts by force after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau implemented the Emergencies Act.
Now back at home in Vernon, Gaudry says he has the perspective of looking at the events from both the inside and the outside.
"I had a friend who was arrested. Police broke the window of his truck so the tow trucks could remove it. Others had their vehicles seized," Gaudry said Tuesday, after a weekend of confrontation at the protest scene.
Gaudry says he was there as peaceful protester ... "I got a hotel and paid for legal parking. I thought what I was doing was within my rights as a Canadian."
Gaudry says he wishes he could have stayed on, but he had commitments at home.
As to police use of force against protesters, Gaudry says the final holdouts "weren't really trying to leave, but at one point police weren't really letting them leave, either. They had them boxed in.
"No one's arguing the way it went down ... the law is the law. It's just a shame we live in a society where transparency is not OK."
Gaudry says he feels "disturbed" by the way things were brought to an end, having watched it from afar.
He says he feels the only reason things became physical is because police "kept pushing the line back, otherwise they wouldn't have been so close."
He says he witnessed no aggression or anger until the moment the horses pushed into the crowd.
"But I don't believe there was any intent to harm anyone from the police ... it just wasn't very well organized."
Gaudry says, contrary to national media reports, he "didn't meet any racists or anyone spreading hate" at the protest, but doesn't deny there may have been "a few extremists, bad apples who spoil it for everyone."
He says he would support the cause again, but that he "100 per cent condemns any violence, threats or talk of overthrowing the government ... and blocking bridges and borders - absolutely, no.
"I don't think that represented why most people were there."
