A Baddeck RCMP officer is suing SaltWire over a Cape Breton Post story that misinterpreted a news release from the Serious Incident Response Team.
Terrence Justin Sanford’s lawyer, Nasha Nijhawan, filed notice of action in Nova Scotia Supreme Court on Aug. 31, naming Saltwire Network Inc. as defendant.
Nijhawan has not proven the allegations included in the attached statement of claim, nor has SaltWire filed a defence.
Sanford is a 35-year-old RCMP constable living in Cape Breton Regional Municipality with his wife and children, Nijhawan wrote.
In February, the province’s Serious Incident Response Team (SIRT) charged Sanford under s. 173(1) of the Criminal Code. “Everyone who wilfully does an indecent act in a public place in the presence of one or more persons, or in any place with intent to insult or offend any person” is guilty of an offence under that subsection of the code.
The Crown withdrew the charge on May 12, according to Nijhawan, “on the basis that there was no reasonable prospect of conviction.”
First SIRT news release wasn’t specific
In SIRT’s original news release, issued March 1, the organization didn’t specify which subsection of s. 173 it used to charge Sanford.
CBC ran a story that morning suggesting SIRT charged Sanford under s. 173(2). “Every person who, in any place, for a sexual purpose, exposes his or her genital organs to a person who is under the age of 16 years” is guilty of an offence, according to that section.
SIRT issued a corrected news release, and a little over an hour after publishing its original story, at 12:25pm, CBC corrected its story.
“At approximately 2:13 pm, after both the SIRT news release and the CBC story had been corrected, the Saltwire website published a news story which was plagiarized entirely or substantially from the original CBC story, under the byline of lan Nathanson, without attribution to the CBC,” Nijhawan wrote in the statement of claim.
The story referred to s. 173(2) and stated, “without any source attribution:”
As outlined in Section 173 (2) of the Code, the person charged is accused of exposing one’s genital organs to another person under the age of 16 for a sexual purpose. Penalties range from a minimum of 30 days in prison to a maximum of two years. In addition, as a result of the conviction, the accused will be a registered sex offender for a minimum of 10 years.
“The false allegation referred specifically to Sanford by name, age, occupation, and place of residence,” Nijhawan wrote.
Nijhawan continued:
The suggestion in the original Saltwire story that Sanford was charged with a sexual offence against a child, and that he could potentially become a registered sex offender had a negative impact on Sanford’s reputation. It imposed the grave stigma on Sanford of a person who the police had reasonable and probable grounds to believe has committed sexual offences against children and led members of his personal and professional community to believe that he may therefore be a danger to children, including his own.
This impact was even more significant given his profession, the small community in which Sanford lives and works, and the fact that he has a wife and children who live, work and go to school and participate in youth activities in the same community.
SaltWire was slow to correct, lawyer claims
At 4:45pm on March 1, Sanford notified SaltWire and the Cape Breton Post through a lawyer, Nijhawan wrote that the story was “incorrect and defamatory.” Nijhawan wrote that they also forwarded the email to publisher Mark Lever and lawyers at Stewart McKelvey.
That night, multiple SaltWire accounts posted the story to Twitter and other social media.
Nathanson’s story ran on Page A3 in the print edition of the Cape Breton Post on March 2, Nijhawan wrote, under the headline, “Baddeck RCMP Officer charged with indecent exposure.” The story also appeared on SaltWire’s app, Nijhawan wrote, and “in other forums within the knowledge of the respondent.”
SaltWire didn’t correct the story until 4:26pm on March 2, Nijhawan wrote. The Cape Breton Post issued a correction in the March 3 newspaper on Page A2.
“Sanford did not make any agreement with Saltwire with respect to these corrections. No apology was ever offered or published by Saltwire for the false allegation,” Nijhawan wrote.
The constable has “suffered reputational harm, humiliation, and mental distress,” Nijhawan wrote. He and his wife are expected to testify to their experience.
Sanford and SaltWire are due in supreme court in Halifax on Oct. 18 for an order giving directions and setting a time for a hearing.