Category: Best v Ranking Lawsuit

Advice for self-represented litigants, Part 3: LSUC Bencher Joseph Groia “Lawyer-bullies prey on the weak and inexperienced”

Lawyers Gerry Ranking and Lorne Silver-private

Lawyers Gerald Ranking (left) & Lorne Silver. Strategies for cross-examination of self-represented litigant included screaming, yelling foul words and throwing objects at the witness. (as indicated in transcripts of cross-examination with the Judge not present. The lawyers later apologized to the court, but not to the self-represented litigant.)

The Legal Profession’s culture of bullying

Law Society of Upper Canada bencher Joseph Groia and BC lawyer Gerry Laarakker are two of the high profile people weighing in with comments on law professor Adam Dodek’s excellent article: Ending Bullying in the Legal Profession.

In January 2012, the Law Society of British Columbia found Laarakker guilty of misconduct for not being polite to a bullying Ontario lawyer. Laarakker had to pay $4,500 in fines and costs. The Ontario lawyer-bully walked free because the legal profession has a culture of bullying that law societies tolerate and even support through attacks on lawyers who stand against the practice.

According to lawyer Katarina Germani of Clyde & Co. LLP in Toronto, “(lawyer-bully) behaviour is so often normalized by the profession.”

And as Chris Budgell comments, bullying by lawyers is a problem in the courts, not just within law firms.

Self-represented litigants need to be aware of lawyer-bullies

There is a sometimes difficult to define line between a lawyer diligently representing their client – and engaging in bullying. Although there are contrary opinions I’m sure, I believe that most judges and most lawyers dealing with self-represented litigants try to be fair – if for no other reason than to avoid appeals and complaints.

But, as LSUC bencher Joseph Groia points out, some lawyers are bullies who attempt to prey on the weak and inexperienced. That description certainly includes self-represented litigants.

In my own case, during a January 2013, cross-examination where the judge was not present, senior counsel Lorne S. Silver of Cassels Brock & Blackwell yelled, screamed foul language at the top of his voice and threw objects at me. All this is supported in the transcripts. Co-counsel Gerald Ranking of Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP later apologized to the court (but not to me), for the disgusting behaviour, of which Mr. Ranking played his own part during the same cross-examination.  Read more

Ontario’s Law Society of Upper Canada approved & licensed known pedophile to be children’s lawyer – with predictable results.

John David Coon Lawyer Pedophile-private

“Coon was given a licence to practice law in Ontario despite a history that included a prior criminal conviction for sexually assaulting a child.

According to the documents, Coon revealed in 2004 to the Law Society that he had been convicted of sexually assaulting a friend’s 12-year-old daughter in 1991.

… But the Law Society determined there was insufficient evidence to justify what is known as a “good character” hearing after Coon produced a “favourable” report from a psychologist who had treated him from 1990 to 1994…” (National Post)

Ontario Lawyer John David Coon is on the run. Arrest warrant issued.

Accused of sexually assaulting 4-year old girl while acting in his professional capacity as an Ontario lawyer.

Thought to be hiding in Thailand or Cambodia.

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

Far be it that I, or any ordinary Canadian, should attempt to define professional standards for Ontario’s Law Society of Upper Canada.

After all, the Law Society has arranged it so that lawyers are unaccountable to anyone but their fellow members of the Club. Ontario lawyers are only regulated and judged by the same people they went to law school with, worked with and attended office and family functions with.

These same members of the Club decided that a convicted pedophile met the ‘good character’ standards to be licensed as a lawyer in Ontario. Not to mention that the pedophile’s area of practice was ‘Child Protection Law’.

Well, if that’s the standard, who are we ordinary Canadians to disagree?

With the Club.   Read more

Canadian Judicial Council refuses investigation of Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy. CJC says “No misconduct”

Norman Sabourin, CJC Executive Director & General Counsel

Norman Sabourin, CJC Executive Director (photo courtesy of The Lawyers Weekly)

“I have carefully considered your complaint and concluded that it does not involve misconduct. Accordingly, I will be taking no further action.”

Norman Sabourin
Executive Director and Senior General Counsel
Canadian Judicial Council

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

I have just received the below letter from Canadian Judicial Council Director Norman Sabourin, in response to my January 5, 2016 complaint about the actions of Ontario Superior Court Justice the Honourable J. Bryan Shaughnessy. (CJC 2016 Response Sabourin PDF 906kb download)

The letter is dated January 28, 2016. The envelope has an office postage meter date of February 3, 2016. Assuming that the CJC mailed the letter at Canada Post shortly after running it through the CJC’s office postage meter (and that it didn’t sit on someone’s desk) it took Canada Post almost eight weeks to deliver an ordinary mail letter from Ottawa to Barrie, Ontario.

That seems to be abysmal performance on the part of Canada Post. On the other hand, Mr. Sabourin messed up the postal code. So for whatever the reasons, I have just received the CJC’s decision about my complaint. Contrary to the indication on the letter, the CJC did not send the letter to me via email.

I invite my readers, and especially those involved in Canada’s Justice System who love the Rule of Law, to carefully consider the evidence of Justice Shaughnessy’s actions as reported in my articles here at DonaldBest.ca.

Feb. 9, 2016: Judge J. Bryan Shaughnessy under investigation by Canadian Judicial Council

Dec. 2, 2015: Ontario Superior Court Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy secretly increased prisoner’s jail sentence; in a backroom meeting, off the court record, without informing the prisoner.

March 9, 2016: Canadian Judicial Council remains silent on investigation of Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy

Then, I invite you to have a carefully considered read of Mr. Sabourin’s letter, and repeat after Mr. Sabourin: “…it does not involve misconduct…it does not involve misconduct…it does not involve misconduct.”

That any judge would do what Justice Shaughnessy did; illegally, vindictively, in secret, in a backroom and off the court record, is immensely disturbing to every lawyer I have spoken with.

“In all my years of practicing law, this is the most disgusting thing I have ever seen a judge do.” 

Senior Ontario lawyer writes to Donald Best after examining the evidence against Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy.

I’ll be writing further about this subject in a while.

Photo of Norman Sabourin courtesy of The Lawyers Weekly.

Judge J. Bryan Shaughnessy under investigation by Canadian Judicial Council

Superior Court Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy

Superior Court Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy

“In all my years of practicing law, this is the most disgusting thing I have ever seen a judge do.” (Senior Ontario lawyer writes to Donald Best after examining the evidence filed against Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy.)

“It is obvious that, as previously documented by the news media in other cases, the Canadian Judicial Council is delaying and drawing out the process to enable a subject judge to wind down their caseload and retire without an investigation and resolution.

This CJC cover-up strategy is not in the public interest. Therefore, I have decided to ‘go public’ with the details of the complaint about Justice Shaughnessy’s serious misconduct, and will do so on February 9, 2016.” (Donald Best in a February 4, 2016 letter to Mr. Norman Sabourin, Executive Director, Canadian Judicial Council)

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

The Canadian Judicial Council is investigating Ontario Superior Court Judge J. Bryan Shaughnessy for serious misconduct involving the illegal and secret substitution of a court order; made in secret and off the court record in a deliberate, vindictive and premeditated extra-judicial abuse of his position and authority.

On May 3, 2013 after court had finished and I had been sentenced and taken into custody, Justice Shaughnessy then went to a backroom where he secretly increased my prison sentence, without a hearing, without informing me as a self-represented litigant, and arranged everything so I would not discover the increased sentence until told by the prison staff at some unknown time in the future.

It is a given that Justice Shaughnessy would not have committed this misconduct had I been represented by a lawyer, but as a self-represented litigant I was vulnerable and defenseless against his abuse of power.

I wrote about Justice Shaughnessy’s actions in a December 2, 2015 article published on my website, and included copies of Justice Shaughnessy’s original January 15, 2010 Warrant of Committal and his secretly substituted May 3, 2013 order that increased my jail sentence by a month without informing me.

20100115 Warrant Justice Shaughnessy SAN

20130503 Warrant Justice Shaughnessy SAN

(click photos to see full size*)

I made a formal complaint to the Canadian Judicial Council, the organization mandated to investigate misconduct by federally appointed judges, however it appears that the organization is ‘going slow’ in its investigation of Justice Shaughnessy in an obvious strategy to enable a subject judge to wind down their caseload and retire without an investigation and resolution.

This is not in the public interest and I have therefore decided to publish the complaint, all supporting evidence and my communications with the CJC so that Canadians can have transparency and be able to discuss this and similar incidents of serious judicial misconduct.

February 4, 2016 letter to CJC Director Norman Sabourin    Read more

When lawyers and police break the law together, what justice can exist for ordinary citizens?

Faskens lawyer Gerald Ranking illegally hired OPP Sergeant Jim Van Allen to perform an illegal investigation. Section he Criminal Code calls it

Fasken Martineau lawyer Gerald Ranking (left) illegally hired OPP Sergeant Jim Van Allen to perform an illegal investigation to benefit Ranking’s clients. Section 120 (1)(a)(i) & (ii) of the Criminal Code calls that ‘Bribery of a Peace Officer’

Alabama: Yet another case of corrupt police and corrupt lawyers working together. 

by Donald Best

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

Leaked documents reveal that for over ten years a group of corrupt Dothan, Alabama police officers (including the current Chief of Police) planted drugs and weapons on hundreds of innocent young black men.

Instead of stopping the practice and freeing the innocent prisoners, the local District Attorney covered up and colluded with the corrupt police.

Collusion between corrupt police and corrupt lawyers is a worrisome issue in the justice system simply because we are beginning to see increasing reports of this type. The news from Dothan, Alabama is only the latest story.

As I reported last March, Louisiana plaintiff Douglas Dendinger was arrested and charged with battery, obstruction of justice and intimidating a witness after five police officers and two prosecuting attorneys jointly provided false evidence that they saw Dendinger physically assault and intimidate a police officer as he served the officer with legal documents. Luckily for Mr. Dendinger that (as in my case) he had a hidden recording proving that the police and attorneys perjured themselves and lied to the court.

In my own case, lawyers and police committed various wrongdoing; including fabricating false and deceptive evidence, lying to the court, committing a fraud upon the court by representing a phoney non-existent business entity, anonymously threatening witnesses and illegally hiring a corrupt Ontario Provincial Police officer ‘on the side’ to perform illegal acts and other misconduct.

Canadians rely upon the legal profession to monitor the police, make rogue officers accountable and to act as a deterent. When corrupt lawyers work hand in hand with corrupt police officers, and the Law Society of Upper Canada covers up and whitewashes, how can ordinary citizens hope for justice?

Toronto Star closes reader commenting. No loss; they were already deleting any comments about Best vs. Ranking lawsuit or Donald Best

Toronto Star Commenting-private

by Donald Best

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

As the traditional news media struggles to survive in a world where everyone and anyone can publish a story or broadcast breaking news live from anywhere with just a mobile phone, newspaper publishers are being forced to make some tough choices.

Today the Toronto Star announced the immediate end of reader commenting. Visitor stats will surely suffer as I found myself returning five or ten times to various stories to watch the reader discussion unfold. Now I’ll read the story once and move on. It must be the same for many others.

Paul Schabas is probably Canada's foremost media lawyer

Paul Schabas is probably Canada’s foremost media lawyer (photo courtesy of the Toronto Star newspaper)

Killing the Donald Best story

It won’t really matter as far as my story goes, because the Toronto Star has been systematically deleting all mention of my name and court case in the comments for about a year.

Some of my friends have speculated as to why the Star has been censoring my story. Over the past year, several Star journalists expressed interest and even wild enthusiasm about my lawsuit and the solid evidence showing wrongdoing by lawyers and police, but (so I am told) there seems to be a roadblock at the editor level.

One of my friends speculates that this might have something to do with the fact that Paul Schabas of Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP, one of the lawyers I am suing, acts for the Toronto Star in many legal cases right up to the Supreme Court of Canada level. If it was true that Mr. Schabas was advising The Star not to cover my story, that would be interesting as in the many news stories I’ve read Mr. Schabas is always demanding the right to publish and fighting for freedom of the press.

Perhaps Mr. Schabas feels differently about freedom of the press when he and his fellow lawyers are the subject of the story?

Or, perhaps not.

In any event, The Star closed reader commenting at the newspaper’s website. Will the Globe and Mail or National Post follow the Star’s lead? And, will it really matter if they do?

 * Photo of Paul Schabas courtesy of the Toronto Star

Lawyer and police misconduct in Donald Best case “reads like a John Grisham novel”

John Grisham-Rogue Lawyer private

Perjury. Violence. Abduction. Threats to rape and murder witnesses. Anonymous internet threats from a Bay Street law firm. A Canadian judge’s secret backroom order.

Best vs. Ranking is just another civil lawsuit in Ontario Superior Court…

by Donald Best

by Donald Best

A judge once remarked on the record that my case reads like the plot from a John Grisham novel.

I can’t disagree. I wonder what Mr. Grisham himself might think. (Grisham photo above courtesy of the Toronto Star)

Like most Grisham novels the stakes in my case are high enough at US$120 million dollars to cause some lawyers, accountants, police officers and other professionals to step over the line.

Way over the line.

“My case is complex, but my April 23, 2015 sworn affidavit provides a basic summary and is, frankly, a pretty good page-turner at bedtime.”

Download Donald Best’s April 23, 2015 affidavit. (PDF 882kb without exhibits)

My case has seen some people on the other side (including certain lawyers and police officers) proveably commit various crimes including: fabricating evidence, lying to the court [1], fraudulently using a phoney non-existent ‘company’ as a lawyer’s client to petition the courts and transfer a million dollars [2], illegally hiring a corrupt OPP police sergeant ‘on the side’ to work against me in a civil lawsuit [3] and putting an innocent man in jail using proveably false, fabricated evidence. [4]

Welcome to civil litigation involving the Caribbean island nation of Barbados.

Also like a John Grisham novel, my witnesses, lawyers, myself and our family members have been the targets of a long-running campaign of violence, harassment and threats designed to deter us from seeking justice before the courts.

In the Greater Toronto Area, I was assaulted in the street. Also in the GTA, a man with a Caribbean accent approached and threatened one of my children over this case. My family’s auto was shot up. While my former lawyer was out of Canada litigating my case, his wife and family received an intimidating anonymous phone call from a person with a Barbados accent. My lawyer’s wife gathered up her children and fled their Orillia, Ontario home in terror; exactly as was intended by the caller.

One of my witnesses was abducted and beaten at gunpoint by a person connected with the other side in Barbados. One of my witnesses was threatened with job loss if he testified, and was fired from the University of the West Indies after he testified anyway.

Illegally and behind my back, an Ontario judge secretly substituted a changed court order in a backroom meeting; off the court record and without notifying me even though I was a self-represented litigant. This kind of judicial ‘Star Chamber’ activity regularly happens in Iran or Russia, but surely not in Canada; except when it does. [5]   Read more

Police and media response to Lynelle Cantwell and ‘Ugliest Girls’ online poll shows double standard

Cyberbullying victim Lynelle Cantwell (photo courtesy of Toronto Star)

Lynelle Cantwell (photo courtesy Toronto Star)

ST. JOHN’S, N.L.—A school board in Newfoundland and police are now investigating a case of cyberbullying involving an anonymous poll ranking girls at a high school based on their looks.

Lynelle Cantwell, a student at Holy Trinity High School in Torbay, is getting national attention for her response to the creators of the online poll, called “Ugliest Girls in Grade 12.”

Toronto Star: ‘Ugliest Girls’ online poll under police investigation in Newfoundland

by Donald Best

by Donald Best

Opposing internet bullying is a popular cause these days. Investigating online bullying is also a popular police activity that nets law enforcement easily-gained positive recognition in the community; but only as long as the perpetrators are low hanging fruit like high school students and not members of a protected class like lawyers from big Bay Street law firms.

The contrast is stark.

On one hand, a story about high school student Lynelle Cantwell and anonymous online poll for the ‘ugliest girls’ receives national news media attention about online bullying.

On the other hand, when sworn forensic evidence filed in Ontario Superior Court shows that personnel from the Toronto office of Miller Thomson LLP, one of Canada’s largest law firms, sent anonymous threatening internet messages to several witnesses in the Best v. Ranking civil lawsuit, the news media coverage is… Zero.

“The anonymous online messages and emails even include threats to murder and rape female witnesses.”

The anonymous threats and harassment originating from the Miller Thomson LLP law firm and elsewhere are part of a campaign of anonymous threats, harassment and criminal acts that has been ongoing for years, even to the present day.

Here are some samples taken from the court record:  Read more

Ontario Superior Court Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy secretly increased prisoner’s jail sentence; in a backroom meeting, off the court record, without informing the prisoner.

Ontario Superior Court of Justice-private

How Justice Shaughnessy:

– Secretly substituted a new Warrant of Committal that included an increased sentence,

– Misled a self-represented litigant and made an inaccurate court record transcript,

– Ordered a self-represented litigant excluded from parts of the legal process in his own civil case hearing.

20100115 Warrant Justice Shaughnessy SAN

20130503 Warrant Justice Shaughnessy SAN

 (click photos to see full size*)

by Donald Best

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police.

UPDATED: Canadian Judicial Council investigates Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy.

Original story, published December 2, 2015…

On May 3, 2013, I stood without a lawyer as an unrepresented / self-represented litigant before Ontario Superior Court Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy. I heard his words refusing my application to overturn my January 15, 2010, conviction ‘in absentia’ and three-month sentence for Contempt of Civil Court in a civil litigation costs hearing. I had not attended the January 15, 2010 hearing as I was overseas and unaware of it.

The judge looked me straight in the eye and said on the court record that he was lifting the stay that he himself had placed upon his January 15, 2010, Warrant of Committal for my imprisonment and that I would now be taken to prison.

What Justice Shaughnessy didn’t tell me, and what I couldn’t know as the court police slapped on the handcuffs and took me to the cold cells below, was that even though my hearing was over and the judge had left the courtroom, he wasn’t quite finished with me.

While I paced in the basement cells awaiting transfer to prison, Justice Shaughnessy sat in some backroom where, off the court record, he secretly signed and substituted a new and changed Warrant of Committal that effectively increased my sentence by one-third.

Behind my back, the judge secretly arranged that I would only discover the increased sentence as a special surprise at some unknown time in the future; perhaps even months later as I neared my anticipated release date.

Superior Court Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy

Superior Court Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy

Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy placed none of this on the court record transcript. He did it secretly after he left the courtroom and after I was led away in custody. Had he wanted to, he could have called me back to court to inform me, or even come down to the cells to tell me.

Justice Shaughnessy said nothing of this new and increased sentence to me, to my lawyer when I had one, or to anyone else in court, either on May 3, 2013, or during the many preceding court dates attended over a period of nine months. Not having any knowledge of the judge’s intention to secretly substitute a new Warrant of Committal with an increased sentence, I did not have an opportunity to make submissions to him or to argue against the legality of his actions. He arranged everything so I would learn about my increased sentence from some prison guard.

Further, on May 3, 2013 Justice Shaughnessy washed his hands of me and ordered that I was never again to be brought before him, so he made sure that he would never have to face me after I learned of his backroom surprise. As noted on page 69 of the May 3, 2013 court record transcript, just before he left the courtroom Justice Shaughnessy said:

“Further, I will also notate that I am no longer seized of this matter and I hereby direct that any further and other applications relating to this proceedings are to be heard by another judge.”

An acquaintance later remarked that Justice Shaughnessy must have quite a wicked sense of humour; even if his values, ethics, sense of justice and fair play appear to fall short.

An unrepresented defendant is fair game in Ontario Superior Court

I doubt that Justice Shaughnessy would have even attempted to secretly increase my sentence and substitute a new Warrant of Committal had a lawyer represented me. But as I was only an ordinary Canadian before the court with no lawyer, I was fair game.   Read more

Internet Expert: DonaldBest.CA visitor stats ‘astonishing’

Website Visitor Stats-SAN20.1% of first-time visitors spend over an hour at DonaldBest.CA

An additional 10.8% of first-time visitors spend from 5 minutes to an hour.

by Donald Best

by Donald Best

Last week an Internet Expert examined the visitor statistics and records for DonaldBest.CA and became visibly excited about some of his observations.

My personal website has been online since July of 2014, but all this is new to me so I never really looked at anything other than the number of daily visitors, along with making notes of visits from some of the law firms and other defendants that I am suing in the civil lawsuit known as ‘Donald Best v. Gerald Ranking et al’. (Superior Court of Justice, Central East Region: Barrie, Court File No. 14-0815)

The fact the expert finds ‘most astonishing’ is that 20.1% of first-time visitors to DonaldBest.CA spent over an hour clicking through the website and downloading documents and exhibits. Apparently this is first-time visitor behaviour that major websites would kill for; but what did I know about this?

Add to that an additional 10.8% of first-time visitors that spent from 5 minutes to an hour and, according to the expert, you have an “astonishing” 30.9% of first-time visitors spending major time to examine my website in detail.

This is, I am told, visitor performance that major websites would gladly pay through the nose for if it were that simple.

What is the reason for this visitor behaviour? The expert has a few theories.

Cassels Brock Lawyers-private

Law Firms are Major Visitors to DonaldBest.CA

Some of the most dedicated visitors to my website are the Canadian law firms that are defendants in my civil lawsuit Best v. Ranking. These defendant law firms have visited my website hundreds of times in the past year; sometimes spending hours on each visit reading articles and downloading legal documents and photographs. Of course, I have a list of the files they have downloaded, and the time they spent on the website each day.   Read more

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