Update on Brian Ruhe — Vancouver Meditation Instructor, the Target of Bnai Brith’s Harry Abrams Ruination Campaign to Impoverish Him
by Eve Mykytyn / November 14th, 2015
On November 12th the jury found Mr. Topham guilty of ‘inciting hate.’ This leads to a few questions.
First, the jury found Mr. Topham guilty on Count 1 but not guilty on Count 2. Ordinarily, this is a result we are comfortable with since the state (the Crown) may have proved ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’ that a defendant committed an assault but not have shown sufficient evidence of battery. Mr. Topham’s case is different. He was charged with two virtually identical counts, both relating to his website but covering different periods of time, that is, count 1 was for the period from April 28, 2011 to May 4, 2012, and count 2 was for January 29, 2013 to December 11, 2013.
If Mr. Topham intended to incite hate, would he really have changed his mind in the brief period between counts 1 and 2? We will never know what the jury relied upon; in yet another abrogation of free speech, the jury was threatened that if they spoke to anyone about their deliberations, they would be committing a criminal offense. How is the public supposed to understand the mysterious machinations of the term ‘hate’ without knowing what caused a jury to convict a fellow citizen of such a crime?
Hate is a crime the essential elements of which have been left undefined. As a writer, one must not only discern from the miasma what constitutes ‘hate’ but also guess what elements a jury will find persuasive. If one of the main goals of the criminal law is to prevent certain behavior then clarity of what such behavior is, is essential. What can Canadians say? May they say they disagree strongly with a particular group? What evidence can one print in support of their disagreement? Surely, it is not the defendant’s responsibility that a particular political group is also associated with an ethnic identity and a religion. The Crown, by controlling website content through its ‘hate’ law, is controlling not only what Canadians may say but also what Canadians may read. Mr. Topham’s is not the only blog to criticize Israel and Zionism. Should Canadians then read political criticism only from other countries? Very troubling.
Second, the crown had almost 2 years to prepare its case. Its evidence was contained in 4 binders. Many of the pages were illegible and the Crown itself seemed to have extraordinary difficulties in citing to its own arguments. The defense quite properly objected. The Crown wanted to provide clear copies of the illegible pages in yet another binder cross referenced to the originals. The trial could have been an exercise in maze solving. Judge Butler ruled that the Crown had to provide legible copies. This seemed to present a large obstacle and endless court time was wasted in discussions of printing costs, etc. As a foreign observer it seemed ironic that the crown spent $190 an hour on its expert witness, who as an earlier independent complainant against Mr. Topham might have been willing to accept less, and I don’t know how much money on ‘security’ but had so much trouble producing legible copies.
I belabor this point because it is very odd for the prosecution to allow its evidence to be blurry. I would expect in proving an elusive crime like ‘hate’ they would want their evidence to be as clear and convincing as possible. Was the intent to confuse the jury? Was the Crown merely incompetent? This is not impossible. The judge spent much time instructing the crown’s representative, Ms. Johnston, on procedural issues. This gave me the impression (and perhaps the jurors as well?) that the judge was helping and thus favoring the prosecution. Surely this was unintentional on Judge Butler’s part.
Third, and this relates to point two, the jury was given 62 pages of ‘charges’ (or what Americans call jury instructions). Even if all twelve jurors, ordinary men and women, are speed readers, how are they to read and evaluate 62 pages of instructions and then apply them to four binders? The plethora of material leads me to suspect that the jury was not intended to read the material at all. This would tend the jury toward a guilty verdict.
There is not a sinister act by the jury. They were asked to sit through weeks of testimony about Jewish politics, history, religion, and identity. Jury selection would have excluded anyone who was actually interested in such topics. They were handed stacks of paper. Faced with these circumstances, they presumably decided that the Crown and the judge worked for their province and had British Columbia’s best interests at heart. It is actually a testimony to the weakness of the Crown’s case that Mr. Topham was found not guilty at all.
The battle is not over. Following the verdict, both sides indicated that they intended to appeal. (Here Canada differs from the United States where prosecutors can appeal only under very limited circumstances). The Crown asked that Mr. Topham’s bail restrictions be changed and that his website be taken down. Judge Butler did not decide these issues because first, as the defense pointed out, these requests were improperly made. Mr. Topham intends to present a Charter (constitutional) argument that the judge had stayed at the beginning of the trial so that the ‘facts’ of the case could be more fully developed at trial.
PROFESSOR ROBERT FAURISSON (video):
One of the patriarchs of the revisionist movement, residing in France.
PROFESSOR ROBERT FAURISSON (video): One of the patriarchs of the revisionist movement, residing in France.For more than 30 years Robert Faurisson has been Europe’s foremost historical revisionist scholar. Dr Faurisson was professor of modern and contemporary French literature at the Sorbonne in Paris and the University of Lyon 2, where he specialised in the “critical appraisal of texts and documents (literature, history, media).” In 1979 he was permanently banned, de facto, from teaching.In the course of his independent research into “the Holocaust” Faurisson discovered, on March 19, 1976 in the Auschwitz State Museum archives, the building plans of the camp complex’s morgues, crematoria and other installations. He was the first to make known those documents, which had been kept hidden since the war, and to point out their vital significance. It was in two pieces printed by the prestigious French daily Le Monde in December 1978 and January 1979 that he succeeded in revealing his findings on “the problem of the gas chambers” to the general public. Faurisson played an important role in both of the Ernst Zündel “Holocaust trials” in Toronto, Canada (1985 and 1988); his most noteworthy contribution to Zündel’s defence in 1988 may well have been his securing of the participation of Fred Leuchter, an American gas chamber specialist. He was also instrumental in arranging for Leuchter’s forensic examination of alleged homicidal gas chambers in Poland, and in publishing the American’s remarkable conclusions.For years French government agencies and influential private bodies have waged a concerted campaign to silence him. He has had to defend himself many times in court for his candid and uncompromising writings and statements, being convicted on numerous occasions under a despotic law specially drafted against him. He has suffered at least ten physical assaults, one of which was a nearly successful attempt at murder. He has seen his bank account frozen and had visits to his home from court officials threatening him and his wife with seizure of their belongings to cover damages imposed by civil judgments against his “heretical” publications. His family life has been repeatedly disrupted and thrown into turmoil by such harassment. His health has suffered terribly. In a December 1980 interview with the French radio network Europe No. 1, Faurisson summed up the results of his study of “the Holocaust” in a sentence of about 60 French words. In English it reads: “The alleged Hitlerite gas chambers and the alleged genocide of the Jews form one and the same historical lie, which has permitted a gigantic political and financial swindle whose main beneficiaries are the State of Israel and international Zionism and whose main victims are the German people – but not their leaders – and the Palestinian people in their entirety.” “That sentence,” he declares 33 years on, “needs no changes.”JIM RIZOLI, Producer/Interviewer (Assistant, Diane King) of the Series, LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY REVISIONISTS: Hard core historical revisionist. Jim and his brother, Joe moved from combating the illegal immigrant hordes in their cable shows to dealing with the fundamental and pervading issue of the holocaust. Their immigrant battles led them to the plight of Ernst Zundel in Canada, being prosecuted for having reprinted *Did 6 Million Really Die*! Thus Jim and Joe’s efforts and cable shows also turned toward the issue of the holocaust. That’s when their troubles accelerated. In 2002 – 2003 they began producing numerous videos dealing with the issues surrounding the Holocaust. Thousands of videos, 100s of videos about the holocaust. YouTube videos (700) under the name of Jim Rizoli were banned. His name was banned on Facebook. In 2010, their cable shows were suspended. They returned and then were permanently removed in 2014. They are back to provide a venue of freedom of, telling the story for tried-and-true revisionists and Germans throughout North America, Europe and Australia.
By the rude lie that arched the world,His flag to Toronto’s breeze unfurled,Here once the embattled Faurisson stood,And fired the shot heard round the world.Recomposed by Fred LeuchterLeagueofExtraordinaryRevisionists(LOER)We are in the process of setting up the site and paypal;if you are interested in helping us defray costs, send a check to:Jim Rizoli (LOER)94 Pond St.Framingham, MA 01702
Welcome! This video is of Paul Fromm, Director of the Canadian Association of Freedom of Expression. Paul just returned after two weeks at the trial of Arthur Topham, held is Quesnel, BC, Canada. He gives his account of the trial experience as he saw it unfold and he describes key testimony such as Gilad Atzmon’s who spoke in Arthur’s defence. [Part of a meeting of the Canadian Association for Free Expression, Vancouver, November 7, 2015)
Welcome! This video is of Paul Fromm, Director of the Canadian Association of Freedom of Expression. Paul just returned after two weeks at the trial of Arthur Topham, held is Quesnel, BC, Canada. He gives his account of the trial experience as he saw it unfold and he describes key testimony such as Gilad Atzmon’s who spoke in Arthur’s defence. [Part of a meeting of the Canadian Association for Free Expression, Vancouver, November 7, 2015)