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Levant says libel suit aims to ‘chill’ debate
Free-speech blogger Ezra Levant has accused anti-hate activist Richard Warman of exploiting court processes to publicly "scandalize" him with "wholly irrelevant" allegations, and to discourage his "public service journalism" against human rights commissions
The claim is in an affidavit, obtained by the National Post, that is part of Mr. Levant's defence against a libel suit brought by Mr. Warman
A judge is to rule later this month whether Mr. Levant can examine files gathered by Mr. Warman over his decade of activism against those who post hate messages on the Internet, which includes 16 cases at the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal.
In an affidavit supporting his request for disclosure, Mr. Levant said Mr. Warman's "focus on my political views, and [his] express concern for the political reputation of non-parties to this lawsuit, such as Mr. Warman's former employer, the [Canadian Human Rights Commission], demonstrates my contention that his lawsuit is indeed a ‘SLAPP' suit -- Strategic Litigation Against Public Participation -- designed to ‘chill' public discussion of these issues."
Mr. Levant's writing, including the 2009 book Shakedown, has focused on the controversies of human rights law, especially Section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act, which prohibits online messages that are "likely to expose" identifiable groups to "hatred or contempt."
"That a single citizen [Mr. Warman] is the largest sole user of a legal procedure for 10 years is newsworthy in itself. It also makes it impossible to scrutinize the CHRC's conduct without scrutinizing Mr. Warman's conduct, as they are largely one and the same on this issue," the affidavit reads
In a recent court appearance, Mr. Warman's lawyer Brian Shiller called the request for disclosure a "fishing expedition" that would unfairly expose personal information, and Mr. Warman states in an affidavit that Mr. Levant is seeking "mountains of documents that clearly have no arguable relevancy to the matters in question."
Mr. Levant's affidavit states that he has no interest in personal information, and that Mr. Warman "has disclosed only a limited number of records relating to his own statement of claim, and almost no records relating to other matters pleaded in my statement of defence."
Those other matters relate to Mr. Warman's use of false personas as part of his hate-speech investigations. Mr. Levant said his own "public-interest journalism about this controversial conduct" is "a central issue" of the case.
Mr. Levant calls this libel suit against him and other bloggers "highly political," and describes federal Liberal party strategist Warren Kinsella as Mr. Warman's "spokesperson," which Mr. Warman denies.
That claim arises from Mr. Kinsella's recent posting on his blog of an affidavit by Mr. Warman, which referred to a letter from the Law Society of Alberta detailing the resolution of Mr. Warman's complaint of professional misconduct against Mr. Levant.
Mr. Levant alleges that Mr. Warman "breached the usual convention applying to the confidentiality of documents" by filing that letter with the court, with the result of "scandalizing me before the court and the public."
"Indeed, although Mr. Warman's affidavit was not even filed with the court until Feb. 9, 2010, a newspaper reporter was told of its contents on February 5. I know this because the newspaper reporter called me to ask about the allegation and asked me to reply to the claim that Warman's complaint against me had been upheld. I felt compelled to tell the reporter the facts -- that the complaints in fact had been dismissed," the affidavit reads.
The National Post was told of the letter by a non-party to the lawsuit on Feb. 5, but did not view it until after it was presented to a judge on Feb. 8. The Post was at one time a party to the lawsuit, but has since settled its part in the matter.
Mr. Levant included in his filing a more recent letter, also from Katherine A. Whitburn, the LSA's complaints manager, that refers to his discipline matter as "dismissed."
Mr. Levant also describes his policy for reader comments on his blog, in which he tends to "approve them all for publication, after a cursory scan for profanity." He said one comment that is part of the pleadings in this lawsuit, which advocated violence against Mr. Warman, was inadvertently approved with 73 others, and removed within an hour.
In his emailed response to questions, Mr. Warman also alleged that the accusation at the core of this libel suit - that he was the author of a racist and sexist message posted on the far-right freedomsite.org -- was "invented" by that site's owner, Marc Lemire, as part of an effort to "derail" the hate speech case against him.
That case, brought by Mr. Warman in 2003, concluded last year when the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal judged Section 13 to be an unconstitutional infringement on freedom of expression. An appeal is soon to be heard in federal court.
(2010-03-11 / National post)
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