Warren Allmand was a Montreal-born, Jesuit-educated varsity hockey player turned Member of Parliament whose entire political career was defined by a single, immovable principle: institutional power must never go unchecked, even when checking it costs you everything. His crucible came as Solicitor General of Canada in the early 1970s, serving in the aftermath of the October Crisis, when he discovered that the RCMP had routinely lied to him — advising him that warrantless break-ins were legal, submitting a fraudulent affidavit to secure Leonard Peltier's extradition to the United States, and pressuring him to sign a mail interception warrant that blatantly violated the Post Office Act. That firsthand exposure to institutional dishonesty forged an unbreakable distrust of state power and set the trajectory for every battle that followed.

In 197 ...