Category: Lawyer Misconduct

So Sue Me… Please

Donald Best YouTube-private

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

The ongoing attempt to take down DonaldBest.CA through thousands of brute-force login attacks continues today. (As previously reported here.)

Apparently some persons are upset by what is published on this website – so upset that they hired professional hackers to destroy it. I can’t imagine why the truth as revealed in voice recordings, court documents and other evidence would upset anybody. Well, maybe a few people.

If some people and organizations aren’t terribly pleased with my writing, they probably won’t like my new videos either.

Those stills at the top are taken from my first ‘green screen’ video, still in production. The editorial commentary is easy – it’s learning the editing software that is taking the time. It will probably be the end of the week before I hit publish on YouTube. After that, I hope to make at least one video a week.

So Sue Me… dot CA

The people are who are paying professional hackers to try to take down my website should have more faith in our justice system and courts. If they believe that I’ve broken the law or done something for which I could be held responsible for in a civil action, they should serve me with legal papers.

It is much better to solve things in the courts rather than to commit criminal offences in efforts to take down my website. Of course, some people think nothing of lying to the courts, fabricating evidence or filing court motions under the name of a phony non-existent business entity – but those people are lawyers, not ordinary citizens like me.

To make the legal process easier for the hackers or anyone who wishes to sue me, I’ve purchased two domain names:

SoSueMe.CA

and, of course…

PleaseSueMe.CA

To those who would use libel chill or litigation intimidation in efforts to stop DonaldBest.CA from publishing articles, evidence and fair commentary – please, Oh Please… Sue Me.

Another massive brute-force login attack against DonaldBest.CA website

WordPress Attacks-private

August 29, 2016 attack included over 2,500 attempts in a few hours.

Somebody is paying professional hackers to destroy DonaldBest.CA.

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

Every day there are always a few attempts to guess the administrator password to log into DonaldBest.CA and take over the website. But about once a month the same professional hacker(s) launches an all-out brute-force attack using hundreds of compromised ‘zombie’ computers.

It is obvious that the ‘blackhat’ hacker(s) are professionals because each attack consists of thousands of pre-programmed attempts made over the course of a few hours using hundreds of different IP numbers and computers from every part of the globe. This shows the attacker(s) maintains an asset base of compromised machines worldwide to effect strategic vulnerability scans and brute-force login attempts.

Further, the attacks are not random because the selection of user names includes words specifically related to me, that I might personally choose if I wanted something easy to remember. This shows that the attacker probably has access to investigative reports about me, including my Identity Information and similar information upon which to create a list of likely words, rather than basing the attack on a standard common passwords dictionary.

Cassels, Brock & Blackwell LLP involved?

There is sworn evidence* before the Ontario courts indicating that during a previous brute-force attack on March 28, 2015, a website visitor from Barbados and a website visitor from the Toronto law office of Cassels Brock & Blackwell LLP (IP Number 72.0.220.68) knew of the attack beforehand, and checked on the results during the attack.

Before you start to say that it would be impossible that anyone from a large and respected law firm like Cassels would be involved in initiating an illegal attack to take this website down, you might want to consider sworn evidence indicating that lawyers from large Canadian law firms are proven to have:

That’s not even mentioning the Toronto Star newspaper’s Broken Trust series that documented how the Law Society of Upper Canada covered up hundreds of incidents where lawyers committed criminal offences against their clients.

For over two years I’ve been publishing solid evidence on this website that certain Ontario lawyers committed criminal and other offences, and that the Law Society of Upper Canada and some courts knew of this and covered-up to protect privileged senior members of the Bay Street Boys Club.

No one has sued me, or taken advantage of my offers to publish responses or refutations of the evidence.

As a police detective investigating crimes, I always asked myself “To whom the benefit?”

And so my readers should ask themselves about the continuing professional attacks on DonaldBest.CA… To whom the benefit if the attacks succeed?

Donald Best
Barrie, Ontario, Canada

* See paragraphs 198-207 of my 20150331 Injunction Motion with Exhibits (PDF 17mb – large file!)

Ontario Appeal Court decision clears the way for lawyers Lorne Silver and Gerald Ranking to sue Donald Best for Internet libel.

Toronto lawyers Gerald Ranking and Lorne Silver lied to the court, fabricated evidence.

Toronto lawyers Gerald Ranking (Faskens) and Lorne Silver (Cassels Brock) lied to the court, fabricated evidence.

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

There remains just one small problem… everything Donald Best published is true.

A recent cutting-edge decision by the Ontario Court of Appeal clears the way for residents of Ontario to sue for Internet libel no matter where in the world the offending material is published.

The Appeal Court upheld a lower court ruling that persons are entitled to sue in the jurisdiction where they enjoy their reputation. (The Lawyers Weekly: Israeli paper libel case to be tried in an Ontario court.)

If there was any doubt on the part of Toronto lawyers Gerald Ranking and Lorne Silver about their ability to sue me in Ontario, the decision in Goldhar v. Haaretz.com 2016 ONCA 515 should clear the way if they wish to launch a civil action concerning my articles about them as published here at DonaldBest.CA.

I, Donald Best, hereby declare that I write and publish this website in Ontario, Canada, where I am resident.

Some of my articles document how Messrs. Ranking and Silver, as Officers of the Court, fabricated a false ’Statement for the Record’ and lied to the court in writing and orally to convict me in absentia of ‘Contempt of Court’ in a civil case costs hearing I was unaware of while I was overseas.

In several articles, I directly call both Mr. Ranking and Mr. Silver ‘liars’, which they are. They are proven to be liars by my secret telephone recordings and other evidence. By example, they even taught a junior lawyer how to lie to the court.

Please don’t believe anything I say. Examine all the affidavits, exhibits, recordings and court transcripts posted on this website and make up your own mind.

I also published several articles describing how Gerald Ranking committed fraud upon the courts when he knowingly conspired with his clients to use a phoney non-entity to bring motions and appear before the courts, including before the Supreme Court of Canada.  Read more

Poll: Detective Sergeant Jim Van Allen should resign or be stripped of the Order of Merit of the Police Forces

Jim Van Allen Police-private

A one day reader poll at DonaldBest.CA asked: Should Jim Van Allen resign from the Order of Merit of the Police Forces?

The result was a tsunami of votes that James (Jim) Arthur Van Allen (twitter @JimVanAllen1 ) should either resign from the Order voluntarily or that the Governor General should terminate his award.

Of the 258 participants, 96 voted to allow Van Allen to resign, while 161 voted that the Governor General should not wait for his resignation. Only 1 person voted that Van Allan should be allowed to remain a Member of the Order.

The now retired Ontario Provincial Police Detective Sergeant was invested into the Order by Governor General Michaëlle Jean on May 26, 2010.

What the then Governor General of Canada did not know was that during the nomination and selection period over the Fall and Winter of 2009-2010, Van Allen was illegally working ‘on the side’ as an unlicensed private investigator for the Toronto law office of Fasken Martineau DuMoulin LLP.

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’

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’

Van Allen broke several provincial and federal laws including the Police Services Act, the Ontario Private Security and Investigative Services Act, 2005, S.0. 2005, c. 34, and the Criminal Code, Section 120 (Bribery of Officers) and/or Section 122 (Breach of Trust).    Read more

Vote in our Poll: Should Jim Van Allen resign from the Order of Merit of the Police Forces?

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’

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

What Canada’s Governor General wasn’t told.

NOTICE: Poll closed after 24 hours. Analysis tomorrow!

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

On May 26, 2010, Ontario Provincial Police Detective Sergeant James ‘Jim’ Arthur Van Allen stood proudly as Governor General Michaëlle Jean invested him as a Member of the Order of Merit of the Police Forces.

What neither the Governor General nor her nominating committee knew though, was that during the selection period Detective Sergeant Van Allen actively violated Provincial and Federal laws. He illegally took money ‘on the side’ to work as an unlicensed private investigator for one of Canada’s largest law firms.

We now know that in 2009 and 2010 Van Allen was a Detective Sergeant in charge of the elite Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) Criminal Profiling Unit when lawyer Gerald Ranking of Fasken, Martineau DuMoulin LLP illegally paid him $2,699.93 to illegally investigate me and provide the results for use in a civil dispute.

Evidence of Van Allen’s corrupt actions is public

The evidence is filed in Ontario courts. You can download the court documents via the links at the end of this article and make up your own mind. You can examine Van Allen’s invoices and read his deceptive sworn affidavit where Van Allen and the lawyers deliberately conceal his law breaking from the courts.

You can even listen to a secretly made telephone recording of Van Allen that, with the other evidence, proves Van Allen and his fellow senior OPP officers lied and concealed his law breaking.

Should Jim Van Allen do the honourable thing? (A 24 hour poll)


Only one police officer in history has been stripped of the Order of Merit. In 2010 the Governor General ousted RCMP Sergeant Warren S. Gherasim after the officer crashed his private auto while drinking and driving.

The rules of The Order state that members can resign voluntarily in writing. Termination is automatic when a person has been convicted of a criminal offense or has been subject to official / formal / serious sanction by the police service.

The Governor General can also terminate a person’s membership as His Excellency sees fit.

To my knowledge, Governor General David Johnston does not yet know about Jim Van Allen’s law breaking during the time when the officer was invested in the Order.

Now that everything is known, should Jim Van Allen resign from the Order of Merit of the Police Forces?

Evidence and Background Articles  Read more

4,000+ visitors in the past 3 days. Thank you Toronto Star, The Canadian Press, Colin Perkel

What’s that old saying about there being no bad publicity?

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

Now I truly understand why (according to a friendly TorStar reporter) the Toronto Star has had an editor’s ‘kill’ on my story for the past three years – to the point of removing my reader comments from their website even when my comments had nothing to do with my legal case or personal situation.

The Toronto Star made ‘Donald Best’ and ‘DonaldBest.CA’ disappear from their website.

Could it be libel chill that caused the newspaper to censor my story, name and website? Could it have something to do with the fact that two of the senior lawyers I sued regularly act for the Toronto Star and other mainstream news media, even representing them all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada on occasion?

Big Media won’t allow their journalists to cover my story

In the last few years I’ve been interviewed by many Canadian journalists from such outlets as the Toronto Star, National Post, Sun Media, Globe and Mail and CTV.

It usually starts in the same manner. The reporter stumbles across my website, listens to the voice recordings, downloads the transcripts and other evidence and then contacts me almost breathless for an interview. Their instinct tells them there are several good stories here, and their healthy professional skepticism is soon satisfied by the quality of my evidence.

(It’s tough to dispute forensically-certified voice recordings of me telling lawyers that I did NOT receive a certain court order – and then read the same lawyers’ sworn testimony and transcripts falsely telling the judge that during the same telephone call I ‘confessed’ that I HAD received the court order. What the lawyers did is called ‘perjury’ and ‘obstruct justice’.)

Each time I politely answer the journalist’s questions, provide them with the backup evidence they request, and each time nothing appears in the news media. A very few journalists contacted me afterwards and in a forthright manner explained in frustration and perhaps some shame what I already knew was happening.

The mainstream news media has censored my story since 2013, yet four days ago on June 21, 2016, only hours after the Appeal Court of Ontario released a decision that was critical of my lawyer Paul Slansky, the Toronto Star, National Post and Toronto Sun all ran the same one-sided, incomplete and inaccurate story about my lawyer and my case.

Journalist Colin Perkel

Award-winning senior Canadian Press Journalist Colin Perkel

Did the powers that be decide that the award-winning Canadian Press reporter Colin Perkel should write a story and it would be published nationwide? Or, did Mr. Perkel somehow trip across an Appeal Court release within a few hours, decide to cover the story himself and then convince his editors to publish?

Mr. Perkel never contacted me. His story contains inaccuracies, no background and certainly no reference to DonaldBest.CA where Canadians can listen to voice recordings, examine the evidence and decide what happened for themselves.  Read more

Welcome. Hear the secretly recorded phone calls that the judges refuse to listen to.

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

I woke this morning to discover that I have already had hundreds of visitors to my website since midnight as a result of a very inaccurate Canadian Press story published yesterday afternoon.

Inaccurate or not, I welcome the CP news story because millions of my fellow Canadians can now read about my legal case for the first time in the mainstream news media. If the visitor trend continues, by the end of today several thousand people will also visit my website, hear the telephone recordings that no judge will listen to and read the court documents that prove the simple truths about what happened to this ordinary Canadian.

Please don’t take my word for anything. I welcome your scrutiny. Examine the court documents, listen to the recordings, read the transcripts and then make up your own mind about what happened with my case. And why it happened.

Why it happened is so important.

If you are one of the tens of thousands of Canadians who have been forced to represent yourself against professional lawyers in family or civil court; if as a self-represented litigant you’ve been subjected to resentment, abuse or anger by judges, lawyers and court staff; if you’ve been denied access to justice or discovered secret backroom deals about your case; if opposing lawyers set you up or lied to the judge; if a lawyer took every dollar you had, accomplished nothing and then walked away without a care when the money ran out… know that you are not alone.

There are thousands of us. We are telling our stories, educating, organizing and advocating for major reforms to the justice system and the legal profession. My story is just one more – but it is a rather powerful one, even if I do say so myself.

The Beginning

While I was traveling in Asia in November 2009, I spoke via telephone conference call with senior partners from some of Canada’s largest law firms. I told them many times during the conversation that I had not received a certain court order that they claimed to have sent to me.

As soon as the call ended, these same lawyers fabricated a false ‘Statement for the Record’ court document and lied to the judge – swearing in writing and later orally in court that I had confessed to them during the telephone call to having received the court order. They swore they delivered the court order to me via courier at a Kingston, Ontario address. They did not know that I was in Asia at the time.

On January 15, 2010 the lawyers placed their fabricated false evidence before the Ontario Superior Court in a rushed hearing that I was unaware of and therefore not present for. No lawyer spoke for me. Justice J. Bryan Shaughnessy believed the lawyers’ testimony as Officers of the Court, found me guilty in absentia (in my absence) of civil contempt of court and sentenced me to three months in prison and a fine. The court issued a warrant for my arrest and imprisonment.

Lawyers Gerald Ranking and Lorne Silver lied to the court, fabricated evidence.

Lawyers Gerald Ranking and Lorne Silver lied to the court, fabricated evidence.

Telephone Recording proves lawyers lied to the Judge.

Unfortunately for the lying senior partners, I had secretly (and legally) recorded our telephone conversation. This is why I can invite you to listen to the recorded conversation, and to read the certified transcript of that recording. Then you can compare that recording and the certified transcript to the false evidence that Toronto lawyers Gerald L. Ranking and Lorne S. Silver provided to the court to obtain my conviction.

Justice Shaughnessy’s dilemma and decision Read more

TheRedline.ca – Group of young(ish) Toronto Lawyers set out to reform their profession

A group of young(ish) Toronto lawyers are telling some inconvenient truths on their new TheRedline.ca blog. Hopefully they will retain their mission when members of the Bay Street Boys Club start refusing to shake their hands in court. DB

Some excerpts from Allison Hines’ article ‘Thou Shalt Not Bring the Justice System into Disrepute’

Allison Hines, Toronto lawyer

Allison Hines, Toronto lawyer

I’m talking about the people who do not equate the words “justice system” with “justice”, for which I am one. Now, don’t get me wrong. I am proud to work in the justice system as a lawyer. I’m proud to have the opportunity to help marginalized people maneuver through the system, and to be someone who understands what it’s like to have distrust for the very thing that you’re hoping will allow you to access your rights…this time. I also acknowledge that even though the justice system isn’t perfect, it does provide protection and dignity to many.

However, I see too many flaws and too often. I see that our current system was born from and still imitates feudalism, where inequality and unchecked intergenerational privilege make a mockery of our constitutional rights. These flaws truncate individual rights proving the system to be illegitimate in the eyes of many.  Put simply, the system betrays many of its own people. It disrespects the rights and dignity of those who have no meaningful say in how the law is created, maintained, or carried out.

(snip)

So, I guess what I’m trying to get at here is that instead of telling law students and lawyers not to bring the justice system into disrepute, I think we should be teaching them to question how we can bring the justice system into good standing, for all people, period. I know that what I have written here may seem very negative and critical. Hell, I’d even agree with that. However, I am saying these things because I am optimistic that things can change, but not without a critical view of how the system is working, or not working.

Read Allison’s full article at The Redline: Thou Shalt Not Bring the Justice System into Disrepute’

9 Tips for dealing with an Abusive Lawyer: Advice for self-represented litigants, Part 4

Abusive Lawyers vs. Self-Represented Litigants

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

by Donald Best, former Sergeant, Detective, Toronto Police

Today, a reader told me yet another tale of an abusive lawyer and a court that refused to do anything about it. The judge advised the self-represented litigant that court involves “a certain amount of rough and tumble” and they should “get used to it.”

Indeed, that ‘rough and tumble’ against self-represented litigants can involve almost anything when courts let lawyers go over the line. And judges do let abusive lawyers get away with it – every day.

One lesson self-represented persons soon learn is that the respect and courtesy so evident between opposing lawyers, in and out of court, immediately vanishes when a non-lawyer sets foot onto the sacred turf of the legal brotherhood.

Every person who has been a self-represented litigant (SRL) in anything more than a minor civil claim or traffic court knows exactly what I am talking about. Lawyers view self-reps as ‘easy pickin’s’ because, well, we are. Self-represented persons often describe how lawyers deliberately use shows of anger, personal space invasion, belittling comments and sarcasm to intimidate and confuse, both in and out of court.

Summary Judgments as a legal strategy against Self-Represented Persons

Even worse, many lawyer-bullies use their status and credibility as officers of the court and their legal knowledge to deliberately ‘set-up’ self-represented persons in a long-term litigation strategy designed to obtain a Summary Judgment and dismiss the case before trial.

As part of their technique, these abusive lawyers deliberately overwhelm self-reps with a tsunami of emailed communications, always wait to the last minute to serve motions, and use a hundred practiced devices to bully SRLs into becoming ineffective or – much better for the lawyer – goad the SRL into foolish acts of aggression or non-compliance with required legal procedures.

Julie Macfarlane, National Self-Represented Litigants Project

Julie Macfarlane, National Self-Represented Litigants Project

In the court hallways where there is no record, some lawyers aggressively demand unrealistic procedural concessions or case schedules that are designed to place self-reps at a disadvantage. Some lawyers deliberately misrepresent these hallway conversations to the court.

Some unethical lawyers falsely claim to the court that they sent letters or even served documents via courier when it never happened. They then petition the court that the self-represented litigant is irresponsible or vexatious in not responding to the “very reasonable, courteous communications” of the lawyer. Professor Julie Macfarlane and her colleagues at the National Self-Represented Litigants Project found shocking results in their studies of Summary Judgments against self-reps.

Don’t let it happen to you.

Here are 9 Tips for dealing with an Abusive Lawyer 

1. Always remain calm. Lawyer-bullies try to provoke self-represented litigants into inappropriate behaviour and into making inappropriate statements both in and out of the courtroom, on the record and off. Don’t be driven by emotion; the lawyer-bullies aren’t, no matter how angry or threatening they sound. As Michael Corleone says in The Godfather, “It’s not personal. It’s strictly business.” Know their game and be prepared.  Read more

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