I am being sued by Wayne Crookes

Some of you may have heard that Google and Wikipedia are being sued for libel. The person doing so is Wayne Crookes, a former Green Party campaign manager (among other roles) and once a major lender of funds to that party.

I am also named as a defendant in another suit he launched last month.

To date, Crookes has something like five lawsuits ongoing, all of them related to commentary on the net regarding the key roles he played in the Party in 2004-2005. The history is too complex to discuss quickly here, and linking to where it appears elsewhere is dangerous as he freely claims linking to sites which he says contains libel is a form of republishing. Indeed, in my case, he has argued that a wiki I helped run during the Green Party of Canada internal elections last summer had a link which linked to a website which had on it one link among many which linked to a site that has content he objects to. (As an aside, when he notified me of this late last November the link had been dead for months, and he did not tell me what material he objected to.)

The general advice given with legal matters such as these is to keep one's mouth shut, but as an advocate for libel law reform, and as a lover of free speech, I have a feeling that I'll be blogging about it.

But there's the rub: Link to me, and you might get sued. It's not that I am out to libel Wayne Crookes. Indeed, he's of little interest to me because if it wasn't him using British Columbia's ancient and outdated libel laws, then it would be someone else doing the same to someone else. My gaze is fixed upon the law and the ancient precedents which have not evolved to meet modern realities. As for Crookes' history in the party, I am interested in it as a reader, not as a writer.

This has grown into a huge legal battle. So far, aside from me, he has sued

Google.com
Wikipedia.com
Pbwiki.com
Yahoo.com
MySpace.com
Openpolitics.ca
Domains by Proxy, Inc
Jon Newton of P2pNet
Mike Pilling
Hayley Easto
Kate Holloway
Craig Hubley
Warren De Simone (the case against him was recently dismissed)
Frank Cameron
Catharine Johannson
Gareth White
various anonymous persons

To be clear, this is a key battle over political speech which should never have to have happened, were it not for our legislators failing to keep pace with modern realities.

When I do blog about this, I will not enable the comments. I have no intention of having a lawyer pour over everything other people say; nor do I wish to personally agonize over what other people write. Current libel law is so bent out of shape that you could probably be driven into bankruptcy for claiming that a specific person says the sky is blue!

("I see pink, Sir! You have defamed me! You must prove me wrong or pay damages!")

Okay, I jest, but the reality is not far off. Heck, even a media lawyer is worried about publishing anything. See the following two posts by Rob Hyndman:

Social (Media) Host Liability - BC Libel Lawsuit
Comment Deleted Because of Libel Chill

The Internet is under attack, and, in the end, either companies like Google will have to firewall Canada as they did with China, or our laws will have to be updated.

What happens next is largely up to you. I have little faith that our courts can do much more than move in baby steps.

That being said, I assure you all, I have been in court before and have fought hard against huge odds. I went all the way then, and I will be going all the way now. I have no illusions about the costs, both fiscal and personal; but I also firmly believe that this must be fought tooth and nail, to the last breath. This is more important than me. This is more important than you. This is something that needs doing for the health of our country.

To function properly as a society, we must be free to critically discuss public figures. No matter what you may hear others say, that is what this is about.

My statement of defense is not yet filed. That will happen soon. When it is ready, you will be hearing about it.

In the meantime, I advise you to Google the name 'Wayne Crookes' liberally. There's lots developing out there.