Comedian Mike Ward was back in the Court of Appeal on Tuesday morning: the legal saga which followed his taunts about Jérémy Gabriel is not over. The young man’s mother is still trying to obtain financial compensation for the defamation and harassment she says she suffered.
This case has been before the courts for over 10 years.
In 2012, Mme Gabriel filed a complaint with the Commission on Human Rights and Youth Rights for discrimination based on his son’s disability and for a discriminatory attack on the dignity of the family. The Commission, considering the complaint founded, filed an action against the respondent, on behalf of Jérémy Gabriel and his parents, before the Human Rights Tribunal of Quebec, claiming the sum of 80,000 dollars. Jérémy Gabriel suffers from Treacher Collins syndrome, a congenital disease characterized by head malformations and severe deafness.
The case progressed to the Supreme Court of Canada, which rejected the appeal in 2021. The comedian’s taunts did not infringe Jérémy Gabriel’s right to dignity and equality, she decided. The Court distinguished discrimination from “discriminatory remarks”. Thus, the judgment argued that discrimination within the meaning of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms could not be invoked to obtain compensation in a defamation case.
Shortly after, in January 2022, Mme Gabriel filed a suit for defamation, harassment and intimidation — not discrimination, given the Supreme Court ruling. She is demanding the sum of $84,600.
Mike Ward moved to dismiss this action. He considers it unfounded because it was brought within the legal deadlines: his show dates from 2010 and Mme Gabriel had known about the comments she criticized since that year, he alleges.
At this, Mme Gabriel counters that the deadlines for his personal action for damages were interrupted when the Commission brought its own before the Human Rights Tribunal.
In 2022, Judge Manon Gaudreault of the Court of Quebec rejected this argument. Mme Gabriel filed this action too late, she wrote.
This is why the latter was before the Court of Appeal, Tuesday morning, to try to have Judge Gaudreault’s decision annulled and to be able to proceed with her prosecution.
But Mike Ward’s lawyer, Mr. Julius Grey, objected: “Can we pursue a case for decades just by changing courts? » he asked.
The Court of Appeal took the decision under advisement and will deliver its judgment at a later date.
As for Jérémy Gabriel, who had also filed an action for damages for defamation after the Supreme Court’s judgment, he announced in the media his intention to put an end to it. But he has not yet filed proceedings for this purpose with the Court, said his lawyer, Me Stéphane Harvey.