In Canada, Criminal Libel Charges Laid For Criticizing Police

BitterOak writes "A Calgary man is facing criminal charges of libel for criticizing police. According to the story, the RCMP have filed five charges against John Kelly for claiming on his website that Calgary police officers engaged in perjury, corruption, and obstruction of justice. What makes the story unusual is that the charges are criminal and not civil. Even in Canada, which has much less free speech protection than the United States, it is extremely rare for people to be charged criminally with libel. It is almost always matter for civil courts."

Comments

Re:ohhh

[shentino]

That's right.

Thirst for power and oppression of dissent is engrained in the very core of humanity's political genes.

There is no escape.

Making it criminal helps the police

[Alain Williams]

It meant that they could raid his house and get a copy of everything that he had, possibly then loosing some of it for him. If it was a civil action then they would not have been able to do this. What is dreadful is that the ''other side'' (ie the police in this case) get an immediate advantage. This is abuse of power.

Re:Making it criminal helps the police

[scream at the sky]

The investigation that pressed the criminal charges was conducted by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, not the local Calgary Police Service. The Royal's are the Canuck equivalent to the American FBI, and are a national police force.

There is a lot of infighting between the various Law Enforcement Agencies in Canada over jurisdictional rights, etc, and to the best of my knowledge, they don't really go out of each others way to help each other out that much.

This is very evident at family functions. I have a couple of cousins (cousins to each other as well) one is local CPS, and the other is RC. They get into pissing matches with each other all the time over who has the more important role in Canadian Civilization, and I am usually the one who gets to moderate their arguments, generally by telling them both to STFU, and handing them a beer.

Re:Less protection for free speech?

[TermV]

The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which guarantees a Canadian's right to free speech, is inherently weaker than the US constitution because it contains a notwithstanding clause that allows a province to suspend many rights for 5 year periods. Quebec's language laws wouldn't stand up to a first amendment challenge in the US but it is allowed to violate the charter of rights and Freedoms in Canada because they used the notwithstanding clause.

Re:Canada is more protective of rights than USA.

[selven]

Even in Canada, which has much less free speech protection than the United States ...

Really?

The first item in the US bill of rights guarantees freedom of speech. What does the first item in our charter of rights do?

1. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.

Oh, right, it effectively nullifies the rest of the charter by including vague language about "reasonable limits".

You also can't start a chapter of the KKK, start publishing material that has no value and offends a large audience.

Yeah, that's the problem. See, I don't think we should have government bureaucrats decide whether or not something "has no value". How about we let the audience decide that for themselves? If we want to prove that our ideologies are indeed superior to those of the KKK, that can only be done on a fair and equal forum of debate where the other side has a fair chance to speak. Right now, all we've proved is that the anti-racists have bigger guns.

You got it

[Sycraft-fu]

The problem is that whenever you stop protecting the unpopular speech, and let the government decide what is and is not of "value" or "useful" or whatever, you open the gates to restricting speech for all sorts of bad reasons. It is the unpopular speech that must be protected.

As an example, look at the sham that is the Canadian Human Rights Commission. You have a lead investigator that said, on the record "Freedom of speech is an American concept, so I don't give it any value. It's not my job to give value to an American concept." Where you don't have the right to question your accuser, hearsay is admissible with few exceptions, and truth is not always a defense. Basically, if a plaintiff can demonstrate you hurt their feelings (with rather dubious standards of evidence to do so), even if your statements were true you can get in trouble.

Really you want free speech very protected, where there are clear lines as to what can't be done and those lines are only there as needed to protect people (like you can't order someone to kill someone else and claim free speech). As it stands in Canada, the laws are used to shut down unpopular speech.

Re:ohhh

[Blue Stone]

Not just our 'political' genes, but our actual genes.

Every simian species* has a hirarchical social structure whereby those at the top dominate and control those at the bottom, often extremely viciously. Humans are little different in that respect.

*Except Bonobos, who settling disputes by fucking, and spend most of their spare time doing the same. Man, I wish we were more like Bonobos.