Afternoon front page: UBC worker denies calling Steven Galloway a ‘serial predator’; the Alberta referendum fallout; and more

It’s Wednesday, October 21. Here are the top stories we’re following today.

Author Steven Galloway’s accuser once alleged that the head of campus security at the University of British Columbia had warned that Galloway was a “serial predator.” But at Galloway’s defamation trial, the man in question says he has no memory of that ever happening.

National Post’s Rob Breakenridge is joined by veteran Calgary Sun political columnist Rick Bell for a closer look at the results and political fallout from Monday’s referendum in Alberta. Bell says the results should give Premier Danielle Smith a stronger hand in pushing back against separatist elements within her own party. At the same time, he warns that the federal government shouldn’t take this result as a ringing endorsement of Canada’s status quo.

A witness at the trial of former Air Canada employee Parmpal Sidhu testified on Wednesday that “there was no fingerprint of Mr. Sidhu on the air waybill” for the crate that contained $22.5 million in gold and cash. Also, “whoever picked (the waybill) up from the printer was not captured on video” because the security camera was inoperable.

Dr. Khdiga Metwally’s son, 28-year-old Abdulrahman El Bahnasawy, was convicted in the U.S. for plotting to carry out 9/11-style attacks in New York City in 2016 on behalf of ISIS. Metwally says her son “has a documented history of severe mental illness” and the “painful experience” has strengthened her “determination, as a school board trustee candidate, to work so that no child or family goes through a similar tragedy.”

Well before last week’s tragedy at CFB Wainwright in Alberta, the Royal Canadian Legion had already decided this year’s national poppy campaign would start earlier than it traditionally has. But now, with four more soldiers killed during training exercises at the military base, Canadians should have even more reason to wear a poppy in honour of the country’s fallen service members this Remembrance Day.