Thursday, April 3, 2025James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Claim, Anti-SLAPP Motion

Family feuds can be bitter and nasty...

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Thursday, March 27, 2025Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, SLAPP, Test

For many years, I have written about defamation cases and SLAPP motions in which defendants have sought the early dismissal of defamation actions under section 137.1 of the Courts of Justice Act (“CJA”) or under the equivalent British Columbia anti-SLAPP law...

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Wednesday, March 5, 2025Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, Pleadings

Pleadings are important documents in a civil litigation case...

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Thursday, February 20, 2025James R.G. Cook, Isabel YooLitigationDefamation, Matter of Public Interest, Anti-SLAPP Motion

Is a threat to “pay me or I will destroy your reputation” a statement of public interest...

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Tuesday, February 4, 2025James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Absolute Privilege

The doctrine of absolute privilege may shield communications that are made during the course of legal proceedings from defamation claims...

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Monday, December 30, 2024Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, Anti-SLAPP Motion, Unsuccessful

The breakdown of intimate relationships can lead to a war of highly charged words that are published to third persons on social media...

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Monday, December 23, 2024Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, Elements, Loss of Reputation

A law partnership is a cooperative but also a competitive environment...

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Monday, December 2, 2024Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Anti-SLAPP Motion, Allowed

In general, a court proceeding is open to the public...

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Monday, November 25, 2024James R.G. CookLitigationBritish Columbia, Defamation

Defamatory publications that are intended to harm a business competitor may give rise to substantial damages, as shown by the decision of the Court of Appeal for...

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Monday, November 11, 2024James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Lawyers

Lawyers writing to third parties for information about their clients’ dispute may need to refer to the nature of the allegations at issue against adverse parties...

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Friday, October 4, 2024Isabel YooLitigationTorts, Defamation, Anti-SLAPP

The recent decision of Cornell v. Trudeau, 2024 ONSC 5343 highlights the importance of providing sufficient details and particulars in a claim for defamation...

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Friday, July 12, 2024Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, Summary Judgment

Summary judgment is a powerful procedural tool that, among other things, permits a defendant to bring a motion to dismiss an action at an...

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Monday, June 24, 2024James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Anti-SLAPP Legislation, Anti-SLAPP, Courts of Justice Act

Anti-SLAPP motions are an important tool available for defendants to put a stop to claims that are intended to silence free expression through...

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Friday, May 17, 2024James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation

A defamation action brought by the mother of WE Charity founders Craig and Marc Kielburger against Canadaland Inc. was allowed to continue after an...

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Monday, April 29, 2024Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, Evidence, Damages

In any civil action, evidence is important for the purposes of either proving or defending against a claim. While in most cases, the... 

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Friday, April 12, 2024Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, Publication

My purpose in writing law blogs is to educate the reader about the legal issues reviewed in court decisions in a way...

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Thursday, April 11, 2024James R.G. CookLitigationlibel, slander, CBC, Defamation

A party seeking an injunction to prevent a broadcaster from publishing a story about them will face significant obstacles due to the principles of...

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Wednesday, April 3, 2024Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Absolute Privilege, Defences

Regular followers of my blogs will probably have recognized that they often feature defamation cases and...

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Friday, March 1, 2024James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Anti-SLAPP

In Gill v. Maciver, 2024 ONCA 126 (CanLII), the Court of Appeal for Ontario upheld the dismissal of an action brought by a... 

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Monday, February 26, 2024Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, Anti-SLAPP, Dismissal of Action

The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in a lot of media coverage about the care provided to seniors in nursing homes. Seniors were...

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Monday, February 5, 2024James R.G. CookLitigation, Employment Lawlibel, slander, Wrongful Dismissal, Defamation

The Divisional Court of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice affirmed that an otherwise private letter may be...

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Monday, January 29, 2024Isabel YooLitigationSmall Claims Court, Defamation, Law Society of Ontario

Litigants seeking damages in an amount of $35,000 or less may bring their claim in the Small Claims Court, which generally provides a faster and...

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Friday, January 19, 2024James R.G. CookLitigationSocial Media, Defamation, Alberta

In Achor v Ihekweme, 2023 ABKB 606 (CanLII), the plaintiffs obtained damages for defamation against a social media influencer who had...

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Thursday, December 14, 2023James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Anti-SLAPP Legislation, Long-term Care Homes

In Universalcare Canada Inc. v. Gusciglio, 2023 ONSC 6874 (CanLII), a defamation action against the daughter of...

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Monday, December 11, 2023James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Police Services Act

In Khan v. Bujold, 2023 ONSC 6618 (CanLII), the Ontario Superior Court of Justice awarded the plaintiff damages against his neighbours...

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Thursday, November 30, 2023James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, libel

In D’Alessio v. Chowdhury, 2023 ONSC 6075 (CanLII), an Ontario law firm successfully sued a former client for defamation as a result of her online...

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Wednesday, November 29, 2023James R.G. Cook, Isabel YooLitigationAnti-SLAPP, Anti-SLAPP Legislation, Defamation

Anti-SLAPP motions continue to reflect the conflicts that may arise over the freedom of the public to express opinions on ...

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Monday, October 23, 2023Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, SLAPP, Matter of Public Interest

When a person believes that someone has committed a crime, it is, of course, perfectly reasonable that they...

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Thursday, October 12, 2023Isabel YooLitigationTorts, Defamation, SLAPP Motion, Dismissed

Our past blogs have discussed anti-SLAPP motions at length. This post explores yet another decision on an...

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Tuesday, September 19, 2023Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, SLAPP, Dismissal of Action

In general, ordinary consumers of goods and services are viewed as a vulnerable class. While in certain circumstances, consumers can be protected by...

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Friday, August 18, 2023Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, SLAPP Motion, Dismissed

Last April, I wrote a blog about a motion judge’s decision to dismiss an anti-SLAPP motion in a trucking protest case on the grounds that the dispute between the parties...

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Wednesday, August 2, 2023James R.G. CookLitigationFacebook, Defamation, Social Media

As we have previously discussed, defamatory posts on Facebook and similar social media platforms can be...

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Tuesday, August 1, 2023Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation

Part of the purpose of our blogs is to help educate the reader about the law and the tests that apply to various causes of... 

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Monday, July 31, 2023Isabel YooLitigationTorts, Defamation, Anti-SLAPP

The acronym “SLAPP” is short for “strategic lawsuits against public participation”. These are tools used to intimidate or silence criticism by engaging the critic with...

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Thursday, July 27, 2023Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, Procedure, Notice

Service of an originating process, like a statement of claim, or other court documents is, in general, governed by the...

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Monday, July 24, 2023Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Torts, Remedies, Injunction

Over the past few years, we have written a lot of blogs on the law of defamation...

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Wednesday, July 12, 2023Isabel YooLitigationTorts, Defamation, Damages, Internet

Online defamatory statements have the potential to reach a global audience and maintain a perpetual existence. It is impossible to...

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Thursday, July 6, 2023Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, SLAPP, Costs

As we have written before, Canada’s civil court system is “a loser pays” jurisdiction. In general, a party that loses a motion or...

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Monday, June 12, 2023Stephen A. Thiele, Michael LauricellaLitigationTorts, Defamation, Anti-SLAPP

Since 2020, two Supreme Court of Canada cases have guided the analysis of anti-SLAPP motions in Ontario and...

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Monday, April 10, 2023James R.G. CookLitigationCourts of Justice Act, Anti-SLAPP, Defamation

While defamation lawsuits continue to receive the most judicial attention under Ontario’s anti-SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation) legislation, the statutory remedy has also proven...

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Monday, February 13, 2023Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Anti-SLAPP, Defamation, Motion Dismissed

Although section 137.1 of the Courts of Justice Act (the “CJA”), the “anti-SLAPP provision”, has become a powerful tool to dismiss defamation actions at an early stage, there is certainly no guarantee that its use will always be...

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Monday, January 16, 2023Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Anti-SLAPP, Defamation

March 2020 will live in our memories forever. It is the month that, among other things, the world panicked, that governments issued emergency orders to shutdown...

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Friday, January 6, 2023James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Removal of online posts, Google, Online Reviews

Online search engines such as Google allow businesses to market their services to a wide customer base. Businesses may also be subject to online reviews which are...

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Friday, November 25, 2022Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefences, Torts, Defamation, Absolute Privilege

The law of defamation permits a defendant to raise specialized defences to defeat a claim. The most common defences are...

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Friday, November 18, 2022Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDamages, Torts, Defamation

Reputational harm is serious. It can have devastating impacts on the person whose reputation has...

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Tuesday, November 15, 2022Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, SLAPP, Defamation

Ontario and British Columbia are the only two common law provinces that have anti-SLAPP legislation. This legislation permits the early dismissal of claims that...

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Wednesday, November 2, 2022Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Contempt of Court, Defamation

In a previous blog dated June 30, 2022, my colleague James Cook wrote about the award granted to a university instructor who was defamed on Twitter by ...

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Thursday, July 14, 2022Stephen A. ThieleLitigationCosts, Defamation, Torts, Anti-SLAPP

The issue of costs is important for parties to take into consideration when litigating a case. Presumptively, winning parties are entitled to...

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Monday, July 4, 2022Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Anti-SLAPP Legislation, Torts

Although politicians continue to be targets of defamation actions, politicians also continue to knock them out under Ontario’s anti-SLAPP...

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Thursday, June 30, 2022James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Social Media, Twitter

As an Ontario court has previously recognized, Twitter is a rhetorically harsh speech environment. A stark difference in political or other views may be expressed through tweets that

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Friday, June 10, 2022Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Torts, Anti-SLAPP

Politics can be a rough profession, particularly where the issues being debated attract diametrically opposed views. Some social issues often bleed into...

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Monday, January 24, 2022Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Torts, Pre-trial Disposition

We have written a lot about defamation cases on this blog and the pre-trial disposition of defamation actions under...

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Tuesday, January 4, 2022James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, CBC

In June 2012, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) televised two news stories featuring a retired Canadian Pacific Railway employee who claimed to have lost more than half of...

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Friday, November 26, 2021Stephen A. Thiele, Alexander Melfi, Gavin J. Tighe, K.C.LitigationDefamation, Torts, SLAPP

Section 137.1 of the Courts of Justice Act (the “CJA”) has made it harder for a plaintiff to maintain a defamation action against a defendant where the issue related to the expression involves a matter of...

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Thursday, October 28, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Damages, Torts

Damage awards in a defamation case can be significant. This is especially the case where...

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Thursday, October 21, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Torts, Remedies, Contempt of Court

In the law of defamation, we only tend to think about the damages that are awarded for a person’s loss of reputation or the intellectual analysis conducted by...

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Monday, October 18, 2021James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Social Media

Capturing and reposting a screen shot of a private Snapchat photo sent by another person can result in liability for damages if it includes defamatory comments about...

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Wednesday, September 22, 2021James R.G. Cook, Kevin MooibroekLitigationDefamation

A British Columbia plastic surgeon successfully sued a former patient for defamation following comments she posted online alleging...

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Wednesday, September 1, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, SLAPP

Section 137.1 of the Courts of Justice Act (the “CJA”), which permits the dismissal of actions related to an expression made with respect to a matter of public interest, continues to...

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Monday, July 26, 2021James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation

A recent decision of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice demonstrates that correspondence written by a lawyer may give rise to a claim for defamation if...

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Friday, June 18, 2021James R.G. CookLitigationSocial Media, Facebook, Defamation, SLAPP, libel

In early 2019, a former model and adult film performer, Amanda Nagy also known as “Mandy Morbid,” posted a message on her Facebook page saying that Zak Smith, her former husband, artist, tabletop role-playing game (RPG) creator and...

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Tuesday, May 25, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, Summary Judgment, libel, slander

Ontario’s Rules of Civil Procedure provide that where there is no genuine issue requiring a trial, summary judgment shall be granted. It has been determined by Ontario courts that this rule is...

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Friday, May 14, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Damages, Torts

Cars are a tremendous invention. Historically, among other things, cars changed the way that people travelled and reduced significantly the travel time between destinations. Cars are certainly very popular and...

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Friday, April 30, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Torts, Injunction

Social media is a great tool for, among other things, the promotion of personal or business interests, or connecting with like-minded individuals. It provides a window to...

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Monday, April 5, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, SLAPP, Pre-trial Disposition

The internet and social media have spawned much civil litigation in the area of defamation. There is no cost to obtaining a Twitter account, for example, and to “tweeting” out a...

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Wednesday, March 3, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Advertising, Alberta, Alberta Dental Association

The law of defamation is unique in that general damages are awarded at-large. There is no upper ceiling for an award and there is little value to be gained in attempting to compare...

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Thursday, February 25, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation

The tort of defamation is all about the protection of a person’s reputation. Where a person suffers a loss of reputation because of words spoken or published about...

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Thursday, February 18, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, slander

The law of defamation is subject to many strict rules, which may vary from province-to-province under respective special libel and slander...

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Wednesday, February 10, 2021James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation

In Theralase Technologies Inc. v Lanter, 2021 ONSC 943 (CanLII), Justice F.L. Myers dismissed a motion to set aside default judgment obtained against a defendant who...

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Friday, February 5, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Limitations Act, Ontario Court of Appeal

In Ontario, section 4 of the Limitations Act, 2002 establishes a general two-year limitation period for commencing an action from...

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Tuesday, February 2, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, British Columbia, Damages

Remedies are an important aspect of any case. In the law of defamation, the usual remedy sought by most plaintiffs is general damages for reputational harm. In a defamation case...

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Monday, February 1, 2021James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Harassment, Torts, Cyber-stalking

Cyber-stalking and anonymous malicious postings on the internet, which may be disseminated across a variety of sites and platforms across the world, are issues to which the...

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Monday, February 1, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationTorts, Defamation, Republication, Limitation Periods

Across the country, limitation periods have been enacted to regulate the time in which an action can be commenced. Defendants are entitled to finality, and...

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Thursday, January 28, 2021Stephen A. Thiele, Gavin J. Tighe, K.C.LitigationDefamation, Funds, Police Services Act, Members’ Integrity Act, Courts of Justice Act, Political Law

Early last year, the Premier of Ontario, Doug Ford, in a highly sensationalized lawsuit was sued for defamation by a former Deputy Commissioner and...

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Wednesday, January 27, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Funds, Insurance Law

An issue that sometimes arises in defamation actions is whether the costs of a prosecution or a defence is covered by an insurance...

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Tuesday, January 26, 2021James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, British Columbia, Twitter

Defamation claim against Twitter allowed to proceed in British Columbia

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Monday, January 25, 2021James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Anti-SLAPP Legislation, Subway, CBC, Chicken

The Ontario Court of Appeal has restored Subway’s defamation action against the CBC which was dismissed in 2019 pursuant to Ontario’s...

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Wednesday, January 20, 2021Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Courts of Justice Act

Vigorous and passionate debate over matters of public interest are the lifeblood of democracy because it is often...

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Wednesday, December 9, 2020Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation, Supreme Court of Canada

The law of defamation is about protecting a person’s reputation. Accordingly, as determined by the Supreme Court of Canada in the seminal case of...

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Monday, December 7, 2020James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Damages, Ontario Court of Appeal

In response to a series of negative and untruthful online reviews, a medical doctor sued the author of the posts for defamation and was awarded...

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Friday, November 27, 2020James R.G. CookLitigationDefamation, Damages, Social Media, BLM Movement, Free Speech

A recent case of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice illustrates the difficulties that a plaintiff may encounter when seeking to stop allegedly defamatory posts...

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Monday, November 2, 2020James R.G. CookLitigationOntario Superior Court of Justice, Courts of Justice Act, Ringette, Coaching, Defamation

The Ontario Superior Court of Justice dismissed a defamation claim which arose from an email sent by parents of a competitive ringette player expressing their dissatisfaction with ...

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Thursday, September 24, 2020James R.G. CookLitigation, Real EstateDefamation, Online Reviews, Anti-SLAPP Legislation, Anti-SLAPP Legislation

In Niu v. Cao, 2020 ONSC 5407 (CanLII), an Ontario real estate agent was permitted to proceed with a defamation claim stemming from online postings maligning...

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Monday, September 14, 2020James R.G. CookLitigation, Real EstateDefamation, Small Claims Court, libel, slander

A dispute between two neighbours over a fence led to a $70,000 judgment against an online activist who posted defamatory comments about one of the...

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Monday, August 17, 2020James R.G. CookLitigationComplaints, Defamation, Anti-SLAPP Legislation, Online Reviews

Consider a time when you had a terrible customer service experience while shopping, going to the dentist, or grabbing a bite to eat with some friends. Perhaps you felt sufficiently motivated to post a negative...

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Tuesday, February 20, 2018Stephen A. ThieleLitigationDefamation

The #MeToo movement has started a revolution. No longer are women, in particular, afraid to speak about incidents in which they have...

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