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CANADA Hamilton Police have invoked a Criminal Code provision called a production order to attempt to force Hamilton Spectator reporter Bill Dunphy to provide notes from interviews he conducted with a reputed crime boss between 2001 and 2005. The Spectator is fighting the order. The provision of the Canadian Criminal Code in question, enacted in September 2004, allows a judge to order a person to turn over to the police any documents related to an investigation. The law applies to journalists and their work product. Penalties for not complying include fines of up to 250,000 Canadian dollars (US$218,000), six months in jail, or both. According to The Hamilton Spectator, this is the first time that a media outlet would be subjected to the new provision. Police sought notes Dunphy took during interviews with convicted drug dealer Paul Gravelle as part of the newspaper´s investigation into the murders of Hamilton-area lawyer Lynn Gilbank and her husband Fred. Paul Gravelle has not been charged in the case. But his younger brother, Andre,along with another man. Canadian police have routinely sought access to journalistic notes, photographs and tapes through the courts, but this is the first time a production order has been used against a journalist, stated Brian Rogers, the lawyer representing the Spectator in the case. "Any time the police try to turn a journalist into part of its investigative team, you have to be concerned," he said. "The reality is that journalists won't be perceived as independent and any source will be concerned that what they say will end up in the hands of the police." In recent years, attempts to obtain confidential information from journalists have set a trend in Canada. • In December, 2004, another
Hamilton Spectator journalist, Ken Peters, was fined more than $30,000 for refusing
to reveal a confidential source, but was saved from imprisonment when his source
came forward. Peters was fortunate. • The same year, an Ontario judge found veteran Spectator reporter Peters in contempt of court for refusing to obey a judicial order to name a person present at a 1995 meeting in which Peters received sensitive documents. In September, 2002, RCMP attempted to seize leaked documents sent to a National Post reporter about a controversial loan to a Quebec hotelier in former Prime Minister Jean Chretien's riding. The following month, Toronto police officers seized video tapes from CTV News containing a jailhouse interview with a man charged in an investment scam. • In July, 2001, Edmonton police seized photographs and video tapes from several local media outlets related to the Canada Day riots. • In March, 2001, police in Halifax seized audio tapes from a Canadian Press newsroom containing an interview with a convicted killer. In January, 2001, police seized interview tapes recorded by a television journalist in Edmonton. The previous month, Kingston Whig-Standard reporter Rob Tripp was forced to hand over his notes and testify in a preliminary hearing. Some free press associations expressed their concern for the sudden firing of two senior editors at the Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ) on February 20, 2006. The associations called on the Canadian Medical Association, which publishes the journal, to clarify its position on editorial independence in the pages of the CMAJ. CMAJ editor Dr. John Hoey and deputy editor Anne Marie Todkill were both fired following the publication of a story criticizing the way some pharmacies were selling Plan B, an emergency contraceptive pill. The situation became even more troubling after the CMAJ's new editor Stephen Choi and editorial fellow Sally Murray resigned from the publication on February 28. In February, there was much controversy regarding the right to publish illustrations of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad originally printed in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten. Free speech advocates supported the right of several Canadian media outlets, including the Western Standard magazine, to publish illustrations of the Muslim Prophet Muhammad. That newspaper's publication of the
illustrations and their subsequent re-publication across Europe has led to violent
protests in the Muslim community worldwide. Re-publication of the cartoons,
when done after thoughtful consideration as to their purpose, can offer context
to the news coverage of the impact of their original appearance.
Copyright © 2003 Inter American Press Association. All rights reserved. . |
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