Saskatchewan’s highest court has rejected an attempt by a Redvers man with white nationalist ties to have his conviction for impersonating a police officer overturned.

Travis Patron was sentenced to 15 months in jail in December for a July 2023 incident where he approached a woman and her child outside the Delta Bessborough hotel in downtown Saskatoon, identified himself as a peace officer, and accused her of child abduction.

At trial, multiple witnesses confirmed Patron, 32-years-old at the time of the incident, represented himself as law enforcement. The complainant testified she found Patron “threatening and frightening,” and her daughter was unsettled by him.

Patron appealed the conviction and the sentence last month.

In a written decision published on June 5, Justice Meghan McCreary says Patron turned to the appeal court because the trial judge rejected his request for a stay of proceedings.

“Mr. Patron took the position that the proceedings should have been stayed because he had made a “freedom of information” request for copies of any and all criminal complaints that were used by the Attorney General of Saskatchewan [AG] to support a warrant for his arrest in January of 2021 [FOI request],” McCreary wrote.

“That arrest, and the conviction that followed, were unrelated to the present matter.”

The FOI in question relates to a separate criminal conviction from October 2022, when Patron was found guilty of hate speech in connection with an anti-Semitic video he posted online. He has also been convicted of assaulting two Regina teachers.

Patron argued that, for the trial over his impersonation of a peace officer to be fair, his request for documents related to his arrest for hate speech needed to be resolved.

“He contended that he required the information from his FOI request to make full answer and defence to the charge of personating a police officer because that information would demonstrate that there was no basis for the warrant for his arrest in 2021 and, therefore, that he should not have been in custody,” McCreary said.

Since he was in custody, Patron told court he was unable to maintain the registered status of the Canadian Nationalist Party. He argued if he had been able to maintain registered party status, as leader of the party, he would be eligible to be appointed as a “designated ‘public officer.’”

McCreary described Patron’s arguments in the trial and appeal as “irrelevant to the charges.”

“The issues for trial were whether Mr. Patron was a peace officer at the date of the alleged offences and whether he had been impersonating a peace officer, not whether under different circumstances he might have been designated as a peace officer.”

Patron also alleged the Crown failed to prove at trial that the complainant was actually the child’s mother.

Again, McCreary rejected his line of reasoning.

“The status and parentage of the child was not an element of either the offences at issue,” she wrote.

“The uncontroverted evidence at trial was that the complainant was the child’s mother. Despite what Mr. Patron argues, no corroboration was necessary on that point.”

McCreary upheld Patron’s convictions and sentence of 15 months in provincial jail for criminal harassment, and 300 days concurrent for personating a peace officer, followed by 12 months of probation during which he’s required to attend counselling and anger management programming.