BC man charged with hate crime because of a website

QUESNEL (NEWS1130) – A man from Quesnel who operates a controversial website has been charged with a hate crime. Arthur Topham, 65, is accused of willfully promoting hatred against “people of the Jewish religion or ethnic group.” He was arrested back in May.

Topham has run an anti-Zionist website since 1998. The offence he is accused of committing apparently happened sometime between April, 2011 and May, 2012. His lawyer, Doug Christie, says specifics of the charge have not yet been disclosed by Crown.

“Mr. Topham has been a publisher for many, many years, and has published literally I would imagine thousands of articles and opinion pieces on his website,” says Christie. “I doubt that the Crown is alleging that all of it is alleged to breach the law. I need to know particulars.”

“I haven’t got it,” he adds. “I’ve just written [to Crown] today to say ‘Would you please tell me what particular communication, if any, you allege he made is the one that you say, or the ones (that are at issue).  I hope it’s not going to be 200 different articles because that will make for a very long trial.”

Christie’s website states that the lawyer is “Canada’s most prolific defender of free speech, having appeared in the Supreme Court of Canada in the defense of freedom of speech more times than any other counsel in Canada, where he has consistently argued against laws repressing free speech, and for individual liberty.”

He has defended controversial figures in the past, including Holocaust deniers Ernst Zundel and James Keegstra. Zundel was eventually deported back to his native Germany. He published pamphlets including “The Hitler We Loved and Why” and “Did Six Million Really Die?” Keegstra was a teacher in Alberta who was fired for teaching his beliefs in the classroom, telling students the Holocaust was a fraud.

Christie says his client has not been pushing his beliefs on anyone.

“In order to access any of this information… it doesn’t go to you unless you go to it,” he says, referring to the Internet-based nature of Topham’s business. “In other words, it’s not broadcast, it’s not transmitted through the mail, it’s not sent to you. You have to, first of all, find it; go on the Internet; search it out; point-and-click… until you get it.”

“And in that sense… you are the one who communicates it. So, the term communication has to be defined in a way that respects the fact that unless you communicate to another person directly, it’s the other person who causes the communication,” he tells us.

Christie also states that Zionism is a political belief, “albeit connected effectively to Jewish groups, Jewish ideas,” and opposing a political belief is not a crime.

Topham has a court date on Thursday. Along with the hate crime charge, he is accused of improper storage of firearms found in his house near Quesnel.