A slice of humble pie

Posted on July 23, 2010 by Michael

Cameron Ward is a civil rights lawyer in Canada. (He is also a pretty good goalie from Canada, playing for the Hurricanes. But that’s another guy.) In 2002 he was arrested on suspicion of plotting to throw a pie at the Prime Minister.

[P]olice – acting on an anonymous tip that someone was preparing to pie then-Prime Minister Jean Chretien at a nearby event – arrested Cameron Ward as he walked to work.

Ward, who did not have pie with him, was jailed for several hours, subjected to a partial strip search and had his car impounded.

He was released after Chretien’s event was over, and the prime minister — who had been pied at an East Coast event in 2000 — never did suffer a pie attack.

Ward then sued the Vancouver police for wrongful arrest. A court ruled in his favor, awarding him approximately $10,000. Vancouver then appealed the ruling, resulting in this a ruling from Canada’s Supreme Court:

The justices unanimously sided with Ward, however, although they struck down the C$100 he got for having his car impounded.

“He had a constitutional right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure, which was violated in an egregious fashion,” wrote the court, ruling that the rights violation was great enough to warrant damages being paid.

This has taken 8 years to conclude. It has cost the city far more than the awarded 10 grand when the legal fees, time and energy, and embarrassment are all factored. But what could have solved the problem much, much, much more quickly? What could have saved everyone from this whole show? It turns out the answer is pretty simple. The courts and police just needed to fess up to their obvious error in judgement.

“All of this has cost hundreds of thousands of dollars needlessly because all I ever wanted was an apology,” Ward insisted.

The audacity.

Filed under: News | Tagged: , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Humble pie

Posted on November 16, 2009 by Michael

Some time ago I wrote a letter to the editor of the Kennebec Journal. After 10 days without seeing it in print, I sent an email.

I recently submitted a letter to the editor. It has been over a week since I sent it. It refuted the irresponsible claims made by a pseudo-doctor. It was properly uncharitable to the man; his ‘profession’ earned as much.

I am wondering if the reason I have yet to see my letter published due to this unkindness. If the KJ coddling anti-science, anti-medicine quacks who have no evidence (or grossly misrepresent evidence)? I hope I am simply jumping the gun and I will see my letter come Monday or Tuesday.

I took an aggressive tact because the KJ has in the past denied publication of one of my letters. They lied to me and said they could not confirm certain facts. It’s no secret they were legally covering themselves. This naturally made me a bit bitter; my letter was about a stunt of a man who actively defended paying an employee under $8 an hour after 8 years of service (in 2005). The fact that his reputation was being protected was disgusting to me.

So, with that in the back of my mind, I wondered if the same was happening with my recent letter. I attacked a quack ‘doctor’ who had recently written about naturopathy. As my above email says, I was not kind. He hasn’t earned such respect.

I made an assumption that the KJ was coddling the man. Of course, I mean two things by that. First, they gave an extra little blurb after his letter describing his ‘profession’. This gives the man credence he doesn’t deserve. Second, the paper has shown itself afraid to let its readers use strong language in the past.

Turns out I was wrong.

Mr. Hawkins,
We are struggling to get those letters in the paper right now because both of the people who handle them have been out sick. We’ll be catching up later in the week, I hope.

Jim Evans
Managing Editor

What happened here was a poor consideration of the evidence around me. Of course, people may be out sick. Or maybe priority had been given to larger pieces (recent editions of the paper have been scant on letters to the editor). I should have given the issue more consideration. I’m happy to admit that I did jump the gun with my accusing questioning. It’s a good lesson.

Filed under: Misc | Tagged: , | 1 Comment »