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U.S. Blogger Breaches Canadian Publication Ban

Posted by timothy on from the how-you-like-them-apples dept.

nnet writes "The Toronto Sun is reporting that a U.S. blogger has been breaching a Canadian publication ban on AdScam. While The Sun hasn't given the URL for the blog itself, in fear of a contempt of court charge, this isn't the first time an American has breached a Canadian publication ban according to the article." The Sun story, though, does give a nice title for which to search, and this quickly yields the story in question.

12 of 735 comments (clear)

  1. I now how to enforce the publication ban! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Get the site linked on Slashdot!

  2. Watch out CmdrTaco! by sulli · · Score: 5, Funny
    The RCMP will march to Ann Arbor and demand that you delete the above post!

    Politely, of course.

    --

    sulli
    RTFJ.
    1. Re:Watch out CmdrTaco! by ShieldW0lf · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I hear a lot of bullshit coming from people out there about how this "publication ban" is a suppression of freedom of speech and how "hypocritical" we are up here in Canada.

      But not too many seem to have clued in to the fact that, contrary to the catcalls of censorship, all of the testimony was made available to the press which is why we are reading it. The "publication ban" is a temporary measure intended to ensure a fair and impartial jury trial. Providing a fair and impartial jury trial requires either withholding the testimony from the public until the jury has reached a verdict, or disclosing it but keeping it from publication.

      You all seem to think that this guy is some sort of "hero" for publishing this stuff. But all he's done is present one portion of the facts and testimony in isolation from the others. Far from informing, this is just leading those who aren't mentally disciplined enough to withhold judgement until getting all the facts to a knee jerk reaction that will be discussed around the water cooler until it has taken on the authority of repetition. It's basically taking us further and further away from any possibility of justice and towards a witch hunt.

      Whoever this "secret source" is, I for one am totally disgusted with his or her demonstrated lack of integrity, and am hoping that they go to jail for this and never hold a position of trust again for the rest of their life.

      I hope the courts will learn from this, and start preventing the press from being present for these sorts of testimonies at all. They have demonstrated that they can neither be trusted nor compelled not skew the trial, so they just shouldn't be there. They should recieve and report on the complete facts of the case when the court documents are released. Aside from being in the interests of justice, that would be responsible journalism, which this clearly is not.

      --
      -1 Uncomfortable Truth
    2. Re:Watch out CmdrTaco! by tomhudson · · Score: 5, Insightful
      You all seem to think that this guy is some sort of "hero" for publishing this stuff. But all he's done is present one portion of the facts and testimony in isolation from the others.
      All the more reason NOT to have a publication ban.

      Considering that we may be heading into a snap election because the government wants us to vote BEFORE all this stuff leaks out, I think the ban was more harmful to the common good than just disclosing everything.

      Would any of this have made slashdot if it HADN'T been banned? Of course not.

      The ban was stupid, and it didn't work. It was inevitable that it wouldn't work.

      Oh, BTW, the CRTC (the Canadian equivalent of the FCC) has already stated plenty of times that they will NOT regulate the internet. That's because:

      1. it's not technically possible
      2. pretty much all communication between a server and a client (the current web model) is done based on a request-response, as opposed to a broadcast-receive.
      That last point is important - if I am reading a message or page I have requested (which is what happens whenever I click on a link), that is not a general broadcast - it's a one-on-one communication, between me and a server outside the jurisdiction of the Canadian government.
  3. Re:Publication bans? On events *open to the public by BurpingWeezer · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The idea was to try to provide the defendant with an unbiased jury.

    Quaint indeeed...

  4. Re:The article... by mopslik · · Score: 5, Informative

    Canada is starting to resemble Orwell's 1984. There are all kinds of things you can't say there now.

    From TFA:

    Gomery slapped a ban on Brault's testimony last week to ensure the Montreal ad exec would be able to find an unbiased jury for his fraud trial set for next month.

    This thing actually happens fairly often up here. In some cases, it's fairly reasonable. In this case, however, it does seem to be a bit over the top, and a stretch.

    A far cry from 1984, though.

  5. Re:Publication bans? On events *open to the public by Garin · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Yes, a publication ban on an event open to the public. Not quaint, but rather an indication of the vast differences between Canada and the US.

    Here in Canada, a fair amount of the law relies on common sense and good will. The intent of these publication bans is to ensure the accused gets a fair trial. This is essentially the judge saying to the press, "Look, if the whole world hears this testimony before the trial gets fully underway and everything can be put into a proper context, it will be really hard to get a reasonably impartial jury so this person gets a fair trial." They know very well that it's impossible to guarantee it won't come out, but Canadian journalists typically respect it.

    What's more important? Having one newspaper scoop another in an attempt to splash the headlines with more sensationalism? Or having an accused person get a fair trial?

    Note that this isn't censorship or a closed trial or any of that nonsense. You can physically go down and sit in the courtroom if you really want to (and lots of the public do). Sometimes conflicting rights have to be balanced, and most Canadians that I know feel that, in this case, the right of the accused to receive a fair trial outweigh the rights of media to publish this stuff immediately.

    --
    In any field, find the strangest thing and then explore it. -John Archibald Wheeler
  6. Re:Publication bans? On events *open to the public by elsilver · · Score: 5, Informative
    OK, so, here's a little background.

    There is currently a royal inquiry going on into some mishandling of federal advertisement contracts. A royal inquiry is similar to congressional hearings in the US, except this one is not lead by congressmen, but by a retired judge. When finished he gets to report back to parliament on his findings.

    Now, some of the people subpeonaed to give testimony at the inquiry are also being charged with crimes related to the events under discussion. They will go to court in the next several months on those charges.

    The publication ban was put in place to ensure things that these people say at the inquiry will not affect their chances of a fair jury trial. (Compare this to the baseball hearings where they players wanted immunity for their testimony, for many of the same reasons.) The ban will be ended after the jury has been sequestered, at which all that was said during the ban can be made public.

    Note that this is only a publication ban -- it doesn't prevent people from actually going to the hearings to hear for themselves; it just attempts to limit what the jury pool will hear outside of the court case.

    Publication bans are common in Canada, and typically have a similar duration and purpose -- to prevent the jury on high profile cases from getting the "facts" of the case from anywhere but the courtroom. The media typically fight the ban, and often win certain relaxations on the ban (you can report the events, but not identify the person giving testimony, etc.). In this case, Judge Gomery has said the media can ask at the end of each day what of that day's testimony can be released.

    I'm generally in favour of such time limited bans, since they are designed to help ensure a fair trial. However, it looks like maintaining such bans is getting more and more difficult in the era of the Internet. Other cases where Canadian publication bans have been breached by American organizations include the Air India case (IIRC), and the Paul Bernardo case.

    E.

  7. US citizen acknowledges Canada by Easy2RememberNick · · Score: 5, Funny

    Someone from the US is interested in Canadian politics? Weird.

  8. Re:Publication bans? On events *open to the public by ravind · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Isn't it ironic. On the one had we hold a jury of our peers in high enough regard, that they are allowed to judge us, on the other we believe that allowing them to read a newspaper makes them unable to be objective in court.

  9. Synopsis & commentary by francisew · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Canadians have a serious problem: corruption in government, with money being funneled in illegal ways.

    This scandal implicates the previous prime-minister, the current prime-minister, and a slew of relatively wealthy people.

    A huge inquiry ensues, and costs an amount similar to the amount of money that was originally stolen (perhaps, misused is a better word). In particular, around 250 million is supposedly improperly accounted for, and the commission investigating the problem is costing another 130 million.

    Since the inquiry isn't a criminal case against the individuals involved, the commissioner in charge of the inquiry has asked that journalists not publicise the events, so that an unbiased jury can be found for the real criminal proceeedings.

    Members of the public are still welcome to go see the events, just not to publicly report them. (keep in mind that until the publication ban was put in place, the TV channel with the live hearings was getting amazing ratings in Quebec- hence constituting a serious problem for finding an unbiased jury)

    I think it is pretty sad that someone finds it necessary to publicise their own version of events on their blog, in defiance of the ban, because it presents all kinds of problems in actually prosecuting the people who have allegedly committed serious crimes.

    As per the slashdotting, a pity even the slashdot effect hasn't torn the site down.

    The whole freedom of speech issue is not really a big problem for most people I know in Montreal, as there is no permanent secrecy being imposed. The events being investigated happened several years ago, and it doesn't make a huge difference if the details are known today or in a few months- except for the prosecution aspect.

    The really scary freedom restrictions here are the 'security certificates' which allow the government to throw people in jail, and not tell people what evidence they are being convicted with.

    Then again, the same thing seems to happen in the US, only justified with terms like 'enemy combatant', instead of 'security certificate'.

  10. Re:The article... by rumblin'rabbit · · Score: 5, Informative
    Your rant is so grossly ill-informed it's difficult to know where to begin. A few points.
    • Inflation reached it's height in 1981 at about 12.4%, well before the Mulroney era. It was never 18%.
    • The unemployment rate reached its height of about 11.5% in 1982, again well before Mulroney.
    • The Mulroney government spent about as much as it took in as revenue. The high deficits were cause by the high cost of servicing the debt built up by, wait for it, the Liberals.
    • Economists say that the GST is actually far less destructive than the Manufacturers Sales Tax that it replaced.
    And so on. Nice try though.