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Publication
bans | Judge Mona Dovall's
crazy ban | Justicia awards |
Dan Zakreski charged | Zakreski
verdict
Full
coverage of the Ramsay trial | Dueck gets Court ordered ban by lying to the
court
CBC wins publication
ban court victory
SASKATOON -A Provincial Court Judge in Saskatoon
has found CBC Television not guilty of breaching a court order.
The charges were laid by the province after the complainant in
a sexual assault trial was interviewed and identified.
The complainant said she wanted
to go public with her story to encourage other victims of sexual
abuse to come forward.
The province said the woman had no clear right to reveal her
identity without a court order.
The Judge agreed with the CBC
that the victim's wishes and freedom of the press over-ride the
wishes of the Crown. Micheal Tochor represented the CBC in the
case.
"I think it will be a
very good impact for all complainants and victims because for
those who want their identities known, they'll have that right
and they'll have some control, or some voice, in that process.
Those that do not will not have their rights affected in any
way."
The province says that the
identity of all sexual assault complainants must be kept a secret.
The Judge ruled that section
of the criminal code that allows the publication bans, contravenes
the constitutional guarantee of freedom of expression for the
complainant, since it only allows for the prosecution to ask
that an order be lifted.
The province has 30 days to
appeal.
Jo-Lynne
Sheane
FLASH: Jo-Lynne's and
CBC's case has been postponed until Nov. 20-21, 2002. A former
print journalist with the StarPhoenix, Jo-Lynne Sheane
took on a television job with CBC Saskatchewan during days when
there were not many TV reporters working for the public broadcaster.
She spent a lot of time on the road before moving to Winnipeg
where she now works for CBC.
Thoroughly professional, she
is a compassionate reporter who covered the reunion of the Ross
children in February, 2001. She familiarized herself with the
foster parent case which sealed documents and publication bans
have made difficult to report. Dan Zakreski,
the StarPhoenix reporter who took up covering the case
in 1999 has also been hit with charges -- not for this case but
for an unrelated one.
The Saskatchewan government
threatened to take CBC Fifth Estate to court if the producers
released the names on the Scandal of the Century Show which first
aired November 29, 2000. CBC went ahead and the Saskatchewan
government state publicly it did not intend to proceed with charges.
Judge Paul Hrabinsky is greatly
mistaken when he makes the statement that " . . . this kind
of ban is automatic under the Criminal Code."
It is not.
The Gordon
Cole case is one in point. When the victims asked to have
the ban lifted, the judge complied readily, seeing the logic
of the argument. The story was covered.
Marilyn Merasty, the complainant
against Ramsay whose name was published changed her mind about
wanting to go public after the Hrabinsky made his authoritarian
pronouncement.
Update: The trial was scheduled
for April 15 so we went to the provincial courthouse to disclover
that it had first been postponed for three days and then adjourned
to Nov. 20-21!
injusticebusters
and Star Chamber material
was being distributed in front of both city courthouses in clear
defiance of the nonpublication orders. Judge
Paul Hrabinsky, the mad banner, was nowhere to be seen.
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CBC charged with breaking publication
ban: Broadcaster airs interview with victim in Ramsay case
By Lori Coolican of The
StarPhoenix
The Canadian Broadcasting Corp.
has been charged with violating a publication ban ordered by
a judge in the sexual assault case against former Reform MP Jack
Ramsay.
Two identical charges stem
from a news item that aired last May, which included an on-camera
interview with one of the women who accused  Ramsay (seen here with his
wife) of sexually assaulting her 30 years ago when he was an
RCMP officer in Pelican Narrows.
Defence lawyer Michael Tochor,
acting on behalf of the public broadcaster, appeared in Saskatoon
provincial court Wednesday and entered a not guilty plea. A trial
has been set for Sept. 10 and 11. The CBC has been aware the
charges were pending since late last year, Tochor said.
The Calgary woman, who cannot
be named because of the publication ban, agreed to allow CBC
to use her name and image in its broadcast, telling them she
felt it was part of her healing process to go public with her
claim, Tochor told reporters.
That might be used as a defence,
though there are few legal precedents to go by, he said.
"Part of the problem is
these charges are so rare that there's very little information
across the country."
Tochor said he has
not been able to find another such case in Saskatchewan history.
The situation is complicated
by two contradictory orders issued by judges when the Ramsay
case first went to court. Judge Claude Fafard refused to order
a ban on publication of the two complainants' identities in October,
1998, ruling that 30 years had gone by since the alleged incidents
and there was no public interest in keeping the complainants'
identities under wraps.
Several media outlets - including
The StarPhoenix, CBC and the Canadian Press newswire service
- published the women's names before the ruling was overturned
by Queen's Bench Justice Paul Hrabinsky, who ruled Fafard had
made a mistake because this kind of ban is automatic under the
Criminal Code.
A ban subsequently issued by
Hrabinsky was in effect, however, when CBC broadcast the interview
with the woman last May.
"There are some legal
questions there as well as some journalistic questions,"
Tochor said, noting the purpose of this kind of publication ban
is to protect victims of sexual assault from further anguish
caused by publicity.
But this is an example of a
grey area where the victim feels publicity is more conducive
to healing than secrecy, he said.
Officials with Saskatchewan
Justice refused to discuss why the charge was laid because the
matter is before the courts.
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Blogging
Blogging has been in the news.
It is the new, trendy thing with 40,000 new blogs being created
each day. I established a blog for this website last September
and it is now "taking off." These are a few of the
pages with ongoing discussions.
- Tasering Mary Lutz
- Saskatchewan Centenary
- Quint Blog discussion
- Rotten apples in the Saskatoon Police
- Blogging for choice
- Michael Cardamone witch hunt
- Implement recommendations of public
inquiries
- Stealing from the poor
- Vancouver's killer cops
- Tisdale rapists appeal
- Winnipeg police misdeeds
- Milgaard Inquiry
- Chief Sabo: can he be trusted?
- The Old Boys' Club Must Go!
- Vancouver activists
- John Hudak: Falsely accused mountie
- City of intolerance
- Constable Larry Lockwood: Exciteable!
- Eric Cline
This is a great way for like-minded
people to communicate and share our views. It is easier than
making a website and marginally more difficult than a forum.
People who want to contribute
simply have to punch the "comment" link and they will
be taken to a page with a box which allows them to write their
comment, preview and post it. It takes a while for the comment
to show up and some people get impatient and repost. That's fine,
I trash the duplicate posts and no harm done.
Please, please give it a try.
The internet is distinguished from other media in that it is
really and truly interactive. Blogging makes it possible to express
your viewpoint even if you don't have a computer. You can go
to the library or a friend's place or an internet cafe. Once
you've mastered the basics (and believe me, if I can do it, you
can do it) you will be participating in one of the most democratic
-- and potentially powerful -- media the world as we know it
has ever seen.
Come on. Don't be shy. Join
the Weblog World! -- Sheila Steele, March 20, 2005
|
 Truth can never be
told so as to be understood, and not be believ'd. William Blake, The Proverbs of Hell
Truth suppress'd, whether
by courts or crooks, will find an avenue to be told. Sheila Steele, injusticebusters.com
If you hold the mouth
of Truth, It will burst out its rib-cage. Somali proverb
Publisher : Sheila
Steele
Got something
to say about this or any other stories on this site? Go to injusticebustersblog Participate!
- injusticebusters
court advice :
- How
to walk yourself through the justice system
-
- Why
you should dump your preliminary hearing (written July 1998 and still valid)
-
- Sermonette:
The
Naked Truth -- (You
will find links to many more sermonettes in the sidebar on this
page
Another target
of Dueck's malice: : Wilf Hathway
Our activism
contributed greatly to the good vibes which happened around the
civil trial.
Index
to the stories on this website
This is not
regularly updated so if you are looking for a particular story
and you have a name or keyword, please use the site search engine(at
the bottom of the page) which IS regularly updated
Index to Saskatoon Police stories
This is a pretty good scrapbook
for the 1998-2002 period.
Inquiry into the malicious prosecution of David
Milgaard untanling 36 years of Saskatchewan police and Crown
misconduct: : Opening day 1 | 2
| 3 | 4
| 5 | 6
| 7 |
-
- Stephen Williams:
Canadian writer subject to Stasi-like treatment by Canadian police
- Terry
Arnold: : Snitch a
suicide?
- RCMP
scenario stings: Brian
Hutchinson starts digging
- Gary
wells: Faulty eye-witness
testimony
- Don
Smith obscenity trial: an obscene conviction
- James
Lockyer
- Hurricane
Carter
- Johnny Cochran speaks up for
Bill Sampson
- Vopnis
- Abdulai
Mohamed
The Terrible Story behind the Atif Rafay and
Sebastian Burns convictions
Trial
set for June 15
We
know part of this disclosure is a forged statement and perjured
affidavit from a Winnipeg cop
-
-
-
-
The
Crown is still fighting Fred Poirier -- and they are losing.
Secret Commissions Case from Northern B.C.
-
-
- 2005: In
the United States the proven wrongful convictions just keep coming
at us!
A round-up of wrongful convictions in Canada
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Revitalizing the
archives
From 1998 until
2002, injusticebusters was in the throes of identity crisis.
What was it? What were we doing? We grappled with editorial policy
at the same time we were learning the nuts and bolts of building
and posting a website. Once we had a secure, paid site I had
full editorial control, although I talked regularly to Richard
Klassen who was forced to move his family several times and did
not always have access to the internet. Rick's pages: one | two
We posted our
earliest and later actions.
Early versions
of the site can be found on the Wayback Machine.
I began following
other threads to stories of police and prosecutorial misconduct
and the site's character took on another facet: a newsclipping
scrapbook where stories could live longer than they would in
print form. I also began picking up other stories of wrongfully
convicted people. It was an explosion. By 2003 there were over
700 pages. I also had contact with several other people (Don Smith, Leon Walchuk, Monique Turenne, the Vopnis) and kept these stories
going.
It was the
story of the Ross children's treatment at the hands of the Saskatchewan
government which grabbed the attention of The Fifth Estate. The civil claim (The
$10M Lawsuit as we called it) was only mentioned briefly at the
end of their show which aired in November, 2000.
When Richard
Klassen began to make progress in bringing his civil claim to
court, the government and police defendants alleged he was breaking
the rules of court by publishing discovery material on the internet.
- MacNeil
clinic (the
document which started it all)
- The
Thompson Papers
- Carol
Bunko-Ruys reports
This claim
was absolutely false. However, rather than risk being thrown
out of his civil claim, Klassen undertook before Judge Mona Dovall
to sever all ties with the website.
The court fights:
- Les
Perreaux report
- QB271
These pages have links which
lead to other pages from that era. Now that some of the dust has settled,
I have been going back through the material we had posted in
the early days. In the spirit of keeping the scrapbook alive,
I have been reformatting and placing links. The original material
remains intact. I hope the information, which chronicles our
struggle is useful to you.
The identity
crisis is over. We know who we are --Sheila Steele, March
28, 2005
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-
Toronto Police paid out $30M in secretly resolved
claims over last five years
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