REVISED - Former Liberal cabinet minister Pauline Frost will have to get used to the waiting game while the future of her political career lies in legal limbo.

The results in the Vuntut Gwitchin riding in the 
April 12 election revealed a tie between Frost and NDP candidate Annie Blake.

After a recount and a Yukon Supreme Court judicial review, the tie was broken by drawing names from a box as specified in the Yukon’s election legislation.

Blake won the draw and the seat, and Frost launched a court challenge a few days later.

Frost’s team, led by James Tucker, is challenging the validity of one ballot, cast by Christopher Schafer, who was jailed in Whitehorse, since he was registered to vote from the Whitehorse Correctional Centre. Frost did not attend this week’s hearing in person.

A second ballot had initially been in question as well, but Frost’s legal team dropped it as an issue.

Yukon Supreme Court Chief Justice Suzanne Duncan reserved her decision in the case on Thursday afternoon, after two days of presentations from all the lawyers.

Duncan says her decision will be released late next month or early August, but she will prioritize making the ruling as soon as possible.

As an inmate, Schafer has no fixed address, although his last permanent residence was in Old Crow and he is a member of the Vuntut Gwitchen First Nation.

Tucker argued that he should have voted somewhere in Whitehorse, rather than the Vuntut riding.

Tucker told the court that “carelessness” in authorizing the voter shows the election was not held in good faith.

Failure to follow the Elections Act in that authorization process produced results that did not reflect the will of legitimate voters in the riding, Tucker argued.

Chief electoral officer Maxwell Harvey did not follow up nor review documentation relevant to the man’s application for a special ballot, he alleged.

Blake’s lawyer argued against that notion, as did Mark Wallace, the lawyer representing Harvey.

Wallace told the court Thursday that the process to authorize a special ballot in April’s election for Schafer did not breach the Election Act.

He argued the act is intended to ensure that people are not deprived of the right to vote. Adopting Tucker’s interpretation of the rules around identification and residency would disenfranchise homeless, incarcerated and transient voters, Wallace said.

At times, his comments bordered on the sarcastic, particularly in regard to the suggestion from Tucker that inmates such as Schafer should cast their ballots in the ridings where they are incarcerated.

He suggested that could lead to members of the Hell’s Angels getting elected to office in the Canadian government.

Tucker told the court Schafer was allowed to cast a special ballot in what he identified as his home riding of Vuntut Gwitchin without the required documentation of residency.

Schafer has spent most of the last 22 years in incarceration, but his last permanent address was in Old Crow, and his family still lives in the remote village, about 1,000 kilometres north of Whitehorse.

Wallace said Schafer used approved identification to cast his ballot, including a declaration that an electoral officer would not be permitted to reject.

The intent of the act is to ensure that alternative forms of identification can be acceptable for people who are qualified to vote, he said.

Case law has established that mistakes happen during elections and “to disenfranchise entitled voters based on administrative mistakes would undermine the public’s confidence in the electoral system,’’ Wallace added.

In a reply Thursday, Tucker said Schafer’s declaration didn’t address his residency nor satisfy requirements under the Election Act.

He had said the same thing on Wednesday.

Tucker’s contention is that Schafer didn’t have any identification nor documentation proving he had a residence in Old Crow. As such, he wasn’t entitled to vote there, Tucker said.

However, Wallace disputed Tucker’s claim that the chief electoral officer did not review documentation relevant to Schafer’s special ballot after receiving a letter from legal counsel for the Liberal party outlining concerns over his eligibility.

Harvey did do a preliminary review, Wallace told the court, while disallowing Schafer’s ballot ahead of the election would itself have breached the Election Act.

Reading from the letter, Wallace also said the Liberals had been informed by “persons with direct information’’ that Schafer had been banished from Old Crow several decades ago and was still barred from entering the community.

That claim turned out to be incorrect, said Wallace. He argued there is no evidence in the case that would meet the legal standard to determine the election was conducted in bad faith, as Tucker had said.

Luke Faught, another lawyer for Frost, argued Wednesday that Schafer had demonstrated a pattern of choosing to stay in Whitehorse when he’s had several opportunities in recent years to return to Old Crow.

Wallace disputed the claim that the man did not intend to return home, saying those opportunities amounted to a total of seven days during which he was free from jail and court-ordered conditions that prevented him from returning.

The man has never established a residence outside his family home in Old Crow, he said.

Blake’s lawyer, Shaunagh Stikeman, disputed Tucker’s argument as well.

She said Schafer has spent most of the last 20 years incarcerated outside his home community of Old Crow and he has long stated, including in court, that he intends to go back there.

His family lives there, and any doubt about his true home or intention to return when he’s free to do so is answered by acknowledging his Indigenous identity and the special connection Indigenous people have with their territories, Stikeman added.

Schafer’s “connection ... to the land in and around Old Crow, is proof in itself of his intention to return and the ongoing existence of his true home,’’ she said.

Schafer had no other residence before being jailed, had never established residency elsewhere, and his ballot was cast legitimately, she argued.

If Duncan rules Schafer’s ballot was ineligible, the most likely outcome is to declare a byelection in the riding.

– With files from Tim Giilck