Posted on 04/04/2005 1:07:58 AM PDT by Pikamax
Blogger busts Adscam ban
Ad exec's explosive testimony posted on American website By STEPHANIE RUBEC, Parliamentary Bureau
AN AMERICAN website has breached the publication ban protecting the explosive and damning testimony of a Montreal ad exec at the Adscam inquiry. The U.S. blogger raised the ire of the Gomery commission this weekend by publishing extracts from testimony given in secret by Jean Brault on Thursday.
The American blog, being promoted by an all-news Canadian website, boasts that "Canada's Corruption Scandal Breaks Wide Open" and promises more to come. The owner of the Canadian website refused to comment yesterday.
Adscam inquiry spokesman Francois Perreault expressed shock at the publication ban breach, and said commission co-counsel Bernard Roy and Justice John Gomery will decide today whether to charge the Canadian website owner with contempt of court.
FRAUD TRIAL
"We never thought someone would violate the publication ban," Perreault said yesterday. "Maybe we were more confident than we should have been."
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, which is set for next month.
Gomery also ordered a publication ban on the upcoming testimony of former sponsorship head Chuck Guite and former ad exec Paul Coffin.
But reporters and cameras have been allowed inside the hearing room as long as they don't publish Brault's testimony until the ban is lifted.
And members of the public have swarmed to the inquiry since Gomery cut off the live transmission, filling a special auditorium.
Rumours have swirled all weekend about a possible breach of the ban by American newspapers, Internet sites and television stations that are outside Gomery's reach.
Perreault warned that even if Brault's testimony has been outed by a U.S. website, it doesn't mean it is now public information in Canada.
"Anyone who takes that information and diffuses it is liable to be charged with contempt of court," Perreault said. "Anybody who reproduces it is at risk."
Sun Media lawyer Alan Shanoff said publishing the name of the blog, the Canadian news site or providing the Internet address could lead to a contempt charge.
Shanoff said American news organizations began breaching Canadian publication bans in earnest with Karla Homolka's murder trial.
'HARD TO POLICE'
"It became very clear from that case that publication bans are very hard to police," Shanoff said.
Shanoff said the Adscam breach would become more significant if Montrealers flock to the blogger's site to read Brault's testimony.
"The information, I gather, is very, very damaging and very prejudicial," he said. "If it's accessed by large numbers of people in Montreal where the trial will take place, it could have a prejudicial effect."
Brault is expected to wrap up his testimony tomorrow, when Gomery will hear arguments from lawyers as to whether he should lift the ban.
Brault's lawyer has asked a Montreal judge to delay the criminal trial until September. That decision is expected on Wednesday.
If the judge agrees, that might allay Gomery's concerns that Brault's Adscam testimony could negatively affect his fraud trial.
What about linking to this post? This post doen't contain the information. Does linking to a site that links to a site that links to a site that contains the info illegal? If so, then I would imagine that everyone on the planet who logged onto the internet today has commited a crime in these yokels eyes.
Remember the game "Six Steps to Bacon"? That's the game where you attempt to link anyone on the planet to actor Kevin Bacon in only six steps. Usually, you can do it.
This should read,
Adscam inquiry spokesman Francois Perreault expressed shock at the publication and said Canadian Liberals will need at least 5 years more years to charge the Canadian website owner with contempt of court."
Canada's playing in the big league now.
Nothing but sympathy for decent Canadians, here.
Gomery Considering Charging Bloggers It has been suggested to me by what is admittedly second-hand information, that Justice John Gomery will consider charging any Canadian blogger who not only provides a link to a site containing banned material, but any Canadian blogger who “names the site containing the banned material.”
http://www.s93384901.onlinehome.us/article-FC%20is%20a%20dumping%20ground%20for%20failed%20politicos.htm
If Gomery won't resign, Chretien could take the case to his friends
Most judges on Federal Court owe jobs to Liberals
February 1, 2005
Cristin Schmitz
The Ottawa Citizen
If Jean Chretien cannot persuade Justice John Gomery to step down from the federal sponsorship scandal inquiry, the former prime minister's appeal would go to a court led by a close personal friend, where three-quarters of the judges indirectly owe their jobs to him. ...
...
An American needs to own a website all of Canada will go to for information.
Justice Gomery
back in December
made an ill-advised decision
to allow for an interview
by a reporter for the National Post.
During the interview
he made some foolish remarks:
that Guite
(one of the defendants)
was a charming rogue,
and also joked about Chretien
having received some golf balls
as gifts
from various foreign leaders.
Chretien has taken full advantage
of this.
During his appearance
at the Gomery Commission
he arrived with a briefcase
full of golf balls
from Clinton, Bush Sr. etc
in order to heap ridicule
on the judge
who had to sit there grimly
through his performance.
(The Canadian media loved all this
and lapped it up)
Since then
Chretien
and his army of lawyers
have launched a lawsuit
to get Gomery deposed
because of his alleged bias.
A ludicrous story.
Thus all very Canadian.
All the Canadian bloggers I have checked
(see, for example, Bound by Gravity)
have removed
not only any link to Captain's Quarters
but even the name of the blog itself.
They are very afraid.
| Blogosphere 1, Liberals 0 -- It is the borderlessness of the Internet that has made possible the release of the truth about the Liberals to the Canadian public. Yet we are still in a phase of change where the Liberals are able to harass and intimidate some Canadian blogs, such as NealeNews, into silence. At this point, it was the Americans who came to Canadians’ aid, by posting the information denied to Canadians on a number of American websites. |
Reminds me of the French trying to lock up a journalist for blowing the whistle on some crooked leftist politicians.
Sorry Ted; FOR THE RECORD, this is my opinion on your information/posting: Your posting is replete with factual errors and reeks of typical naive, ignorance and is disturbingly, misleading. 1-the inquiry has not yet (as you put it) "costed obscenely more than the amount lost during the embezzlement." 2-Of course the ban will be over when less culpable witnesses or "accused" as you put it, appear, however, there is definitely no timeline on the ban being "temporary" and reports also disclose that the information ban regarding "these particular culpable witnesses" or "the accused" as you put it, could in fact be permanent, with sanitized and/or vetted press releases regarding the testimony of these particular culpable witnesses, eventually being released. 3-you imply the ban is, "to protect the human rights of the accused for a fair trial by the judiciary." I find this to be typically naive and typically liberal-minded. The inference is, "let's guarantee the so called "human rights" of the accused. So, you believe Canada is unable to prosecute an open/closed case, if some of the facts about the case have been openly disclosed to the public? You have been well conditioned...to the point you accept the premise and defend it. Furthermore, is it "Human Rights" as you say or legal, civil/criminal procedural rights? By, "delaying the publishing of the proceedings by a few weeks or months does not constitute a lack of free speech," as you write, is in fact, while taken in context, definitely a suppression of free speech, and suppression of free expression, suppression and manipulation of the news media; which will most definitely affect procedure; which gets me to the your correct assertion wherein, "..by the time they are done, we will be sick of it and no one will care;" which is perpetuated by attitudes and beliefs such as yours and as I assert, is , in part, the reason for suppression and/or information "bans". In addition, this is typical Liberal-Canada's method of operation, sanctioned by complacent, ineffective and equally corrupt Opposition Party's. The NEW Canadian Conservative Party; get real!! HOW ABOUT A REAL CONSERVATIVE PARTY FOR CANADA REPRESENTING REAL CONSERVATIVE INITIATIVES AND VALUES.
An Informed Canadian
"THE DIFFERENCE" A very sad example of how the "Liberal-Leftist" socialization of Canada has succeeded. Even "so-called" brave Canadian "bloggers" are afraid!!! Canadian "bloggers" are afraid of being sued in civil action or charged criminally for posting "Adscam" related material. International news media reports, Canadian "bloggers" have disconnected from "links" and ceased reporting "Adscam" and related stories, evidence, testimony,.....OR,....is the aforementioned an example of our represented, "Higher" morals and more diversive, polite, all inclusive, "respect-for-the-law," love-peace and understanding, value system? YES, we will continue to criticize and "blog" every behaviour by the U.S.A. but, at home, we are AFRAID....but, will continue to "blog" nice and goodie, goodie, non-provocative stories.
An Informed Canadian
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