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Two protesters from the Walbran Valley blockade were sentenced Tuesday, after pleading guilty to breaching an injunction order in November 2025. The order barred protesters from blocking access to the Tsawak-qin Forestry logging site. Twelve protesters were arrested in total.
Kenni Apt was sentenced to 12 months’ probation, with 75 hours of community service or a fine of $2,250. They were arrested after attaching themselves to a large wooden cougar statue within the injunction area, intending to block logging activity.
Apt says they feel good about their sentence, but they’re sad that they won’t be able to visit the valley, which is located nearly 100 kilometres northwest of Victoria, any time soon.
“It is actually probably the worst part of this,” they said. “I miss the valley greatly. There’s actually a gathering at a memorial for someone I really care about up in Walbran Valley that I can’t legally attend in a few weeks, which is actually quite devastating.”
Kenni Apt was sentenced to 75 hours of community service after pleading guilty to breaching an injuction order in the Walbran Valley on Vancouver Island. (Isabella Calissi/CBC)
Zoey Barak was sentenced to seven days’ jail time. She was arrested after being found in an elevated sling between two trees within the injunction area.
The blockade in Walbran Valley was linked to the same organizers behind the nearby Fairy Creek anti-logging blockade on southwest Vancouver Island, which saw thousands arrested in 2021.
Both Crown and defence lawyers agreed that the Fairy Creek blockade sentences should be taken into consideration as a baseline. Crown proposed double what was given to those arrested in 2021, while defence argued for a moderate increase.
Ben Isitt, a lawyer representing a number of Walbran protesters, including Apt and Barak, says the judge for this case, Anthony Saunders, was following similar sentencing as Justice Douglas Thompson did with the Fairy Creek trials.
Isitt says protesters in 2021 were sentenced to between 25 and 100 hours community service or fines between $750 and $3,000.
For those in elevated devices, there was jail time between four and 10 days due to the risk it imposed on themselves and the RCMP, who needed to remove them.
A large cougar statue was set up at the blockade in the Walbran Valley on western Vancouver Island in 2025 to halt logging of old-growth timber in the area. (Mike McArthur/CBC)
“They weren’t motivated by greed. They didn’t cause harm to property … they weren’t stealing, so they weren’t committing crimes in a conventional sense,” said Isitt, adding this was also a feature in the hearings for Apt and Barak.
LISTEN | Isitt discusses the sentences:
On The Island8:53Lawyer for Walbran protesters reflects on sentencing
Ben Isitt, the lawyer representing several protesters, discusses the sentences handed down this week for two of the Walbran protesters.
Even though Judge Anthony Saunders agreed that this was a continuation of the Fairy Creek protests, he says the Walbran blockade did not meet the same level of unlawfulness found in 2021.
Saunders recognized this was a first offence for both Apt and Barak, and noted their good character in his decisions.
The judge said he would keep harsher sentences in mind for future offences if actions from protesters were to escalate.
Court proceedings for other arrested protesters will happen later this fall.
LISTEN | Huu-ay-aht First Nation chief speaks about protests:
On The Island10:13: Following arrests of old growth logging protestors in the Walbran Valley, the Huu-ay-aht First Nation says it was inundated with harassing and threatening messages
Gregor Craigie spoke with John Jack, the elected chief of the Huu-ay-aht First Nation and the chair of the Alberni Clayoquot Regional District.