Nuttall, Korody find welcome but little help with freedom

John Nuttall and Amanda Korody were apprehensive about returning to Victoria where, a year ago, they were caught and later convictedfor a plot to explode pressure-cooker bombs at the B.C. Legislature on Canada Day.

But on their first walk around the city after their release from prison, complete strangers greeted them warmly and praised the judge's ruling last week that set aside their conviction and freed them from prison, according to Nuttall's mother, Maureen Smith.

"People would come up to them and say 'Hey, you guys, congratulations'. No kidding, I'd say at least 25 to 30 people,'" Smith said in an interview with David Lennam on Victoria's On the Island program.

"Some stopped to talk to say how terrible it was, what the RCMP did. So it's been a positive experience," Smith said.

B.C. Supreme Court Justice Catherine Bruce stayed proceedings against Nuttall and Korody in a July 29judgment that found an RCMP sting operation went too far manufacturing a bomb plot the couple had "neither the capacity nor sufficient motivation" to carry out by themselves.

Smith said she never doubted her son and daughter-in-law's innocence. "I just knew that God would let them out. I just knew that there would be justice. I prayed every day."

Smith sold her furniture in Victoria and moved into shared accommodation in Vancouver to be closer to the couple during their imprisonment.

Now, post-release, Nuttall and Korody are staying temporarily with Smith in her small James Bay apartment. Through the walls at night, she said, "I can hear Amanda having terrible nightmares. She's yelling out.

"It's just so sad because obviously they both suffer from post-traumatic stress," Smith said.

The couple want support and counselling for their trauma and to reintegrate into society, but they have been offered no assistance, Smith said. "We don't even know who to ask for help"

Despite the actions of officers in the "Operation Souvenir" sting that snared her son, Smith said she still respects police and empathizes with the high levels of post-traumatic stress disorder experienced by their profession.

"I do worry about John and Amanda because they have such horrifying memories, and they're still fearful that the cops can just come up to them at any moment and re-arrest them for whatever, even though they're not doing anything wrong."

Legal proceedings are not over for Nuttall and Korody. An application for a special "terrorism peace bond" against the couple will be heard in B.C. Supreme Court on Sept. 7. And the Crown has filed notice it will appeal the entrapment ruling.

To hear more about this story, listen to the audio labeled Congratulations, nightmares for couple freed after bomb-plot conviction set aside