The Saga of Officer Bubbles

Every human being makes stupid mistakes that they later regret. It’s human nature. Sometimes our mistakes are known only to us after we commit them but unfortunately for some people, their stupid mistakes become known world-wide. That is what has happened to Constable Adam Josephs of the Toronto Police Force.

He was one of thousands of police officers who were protecting the world leaders at the G20 Summit held in downtown Toronto. I won’t deal with that debacle that is currently being investigated because of police wrongdoings at the conference but go directly to the role of Constable Josephs who has since become known world-wide as ‘Officer Bubbles’, a moniker he will carry with him for the rest of his life.

On the weekend of the G20 Summit, this officer’s police force undertook the biggest mass-arrest in Canadian history, arresting over one thousand Canadians, including hundreds of innocent bystanders and at least 800 people who were not involved in any illegal activity, in what has been best described as ‘precautionary’ detention. Most of the charges were later withdrawn.

Constable Adam Josephs of the Toronto Police Services is a fool. Not just any fool but rather a special kind of fool. He is the kind of fool who acts like a fool, then asserts his right to be a fool while actually being ridiculed for being an absolute fool.

In fact, he feels so strongly that he has a right not to be subjected to public ridicule for being a fool that he has taken to suing YouTube for being the conduit of such ridicule. He is also demanding those who produced cartoons mocking him, under the moniker ‘Officer Bubbles’ have their names produced so that he can sue them too. This fool is demanding that a court award him 1.2 million dollars in compensation for the damage to personal reputation caused purely by his own foolish behaviour. His lawyer, James Zibarras told the Globe and Mail, "This level of ridicule goes beyond what is reasonable. The reason we brought the lawsuit is that people have the right to protect themselves against this kind of harassment." There is a very apt saying that is most apropos in incidents like this one. “Forget it and move on.”

Let me give you the background that best describes this fool. At the G20 Summit, there were many protesters about and one of them was blowing soap bubbles in the immediate area of Josephs. This huge bald-headed officer then threatened the woman with arrest for assaulting a police officer if one of her soap bubbles hit him. Despite the threat, she continued blowing the bubbles.

There was Officer Bubbles, facing the onslaught of soap bubbles as they careened down from the sky, guns blazing, bullets hitting everywhere and him standing up straight, his teeth closed tight and his facing grimacing in anticipation of the impact of the (get ready for it) bubbles. (Now there is hyperbole is there ever was hyperbole) He didn’t run towards an air raid shelter or even a fox hole. That’s not what Officer Bubbles does when he is faced with adversity. He faces it directly. Unfortunately for Officer Bubbles, this event was videotaped and the images of bubbles heading towards him were shown all over the world along with his threat to the woman.

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that someone began drawing cartoons of Officer Bubbles arresting various people such as the pope, President Obama, Santa Claus and other famous and well known people and placing the cartoons in YouTube where the images then spread around the world like a hurricane. It was then that Officer Bubbles became recognized world-wide as one of Canada’s police force’s dumbest fools.

Now we all know that when we make a mistake, the best thing to do after that is to correct it and then move on. The worst thing you can do is to sue people who appear to be prolonging the event in the public’s eye. By doing that, the case becomes public fodder and it lingers on in the public eye sometimes for years.

He sued YouTube in hopes of learning who the authors of the cartoons are. It’s too late. The cartoons have been seen all over the world and no doubt, flitting from computer to computer everywhere. “Hey, Officer Bubbles. You can’t sue everyone.”

In Canada and elsewhere, we have a policy we prize very much. It is called free speech. That is the right to give an opinion as to what we think and to make that opinion public. It seems to me that the authors of the cartoons were expressing their belief that Officer Bubbles is the kind of person who would not let position or rank hold him back when it comes to arresting someone he thinks has committed a crime. Undoubtedly, the cartoons are hyperbole but sometimes, an overstatement is a way of getting a message across.

I remember reading in a magazine a page that was printed each month in the magazine’s monthly editions. The article was called, The asshole of the month. A picture of the face of the politician chosen as the asshole of the month was superimposed at the rear end of a donkey. That is hyperbole. The publisher was also exercising his right to free speech.

Freedom of expression is so important to democracy in Canada that even those statements on the extreme periphery of the protected right must be brought within the protective ambit of section 2(b) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Section 2(b) protects all content of expression irrespective of the meaning or message sought to be conveyed.

Most forms of expression are protected as well and the mere fact that a form has been criminalized does not take it beyond the reach of Charter protection. Only activities which convey a meaning or a message through a violent form of expression that directly attacks the physical liberty and integrity of another person would not be protected by section 2(b).

The fact that persons are employed by a municipality does not mean that their reputation is automatically divided into two parts, one related to their personal life and the other to their employment status. Reputation is an integral and fundamentally important aspect of every individual; it exists for everyone quite apart from their employment.

The common law must be interpreted in a manner which is consistent with Charter principles. This obligation is simply a manifestation of the inherent jurisdiction of the courts to modify or extend the common law in order to comply with prevailing social conditions and values. In its application to the parties in this matter, the common law of defamation complies with the underlying values of the Charter and there is no need to amend or alter it. The common law strikes an appropriate balance between the twin values of reputation and freedom of expression.

Although it is not specifically mentioned in the Charter, the good reputation of the individual represents and reflects the innate dignity of the individual, a concept which underlies all the Charter rights. Further, reputation is intimately related to the right to privacy, which has been accorded constitutional protection. However, when a person acts as a public servant, he must expect that his privacy isn’t absolute.

Qualified privilege attaches to the occasion upon which the communication is made, and not to the communication itself. The legal effect of the defence of qualified privilege is to rebut the inference, which normally arises from the publication of defamatory words (or pictures) that they were spoken or shown with malice. Where the occasion is shown to be privileged, the bona fides of the defendant is presumed and the defendant is free to publish, with impunity, remarks which may be defamatory and even untrue about the plaintiff. The privilege is not absolute, however, and can be defeated if the dominant motive for publishing the statement is actual or express malice. The information communicated must be reasonably appropriate in the context of the circumstances existing on the occasion when that information was given.

I don’t believe that the publishing of the cartoons was really done with malice in mind. The cartoons are in essence, a spoof as to what some people think a police officer like Josephs is capable of doing. I remember reading about an event in Toronto that occurred years ago when Queen Elizabeth visited Toronto. After she exited her plane and entered the airport where she was going to be greeted by dignatories, a security guard at the gate asked her to open her purse. Naturally everyone was shocked. The Queen opened her purse and the security guard looked in it and then she closed the purse and walked towards the dignatories waiting for her. Obviously the security guard was stupid but he believed that what he was doing was right, even though it wasn’t right at all. Many years ago, a motorist in Tokyo stuck out his left arm to signal that he was making a left turn when suddenly a truck brushed by him and tore off his arm. Since he was already turning his car at that moment, a police officer charged him with turning his car without sticking his arm out to signal his intentions.

The police have a brotherly code. They look out for each other, and first and fore-mostly, the police brotherhood sometimes views themselves as above the public. This is why, in a society that ostensibly celebrates free speech and fair comment, Officer Bubbles is asserting his right to be free from public ridicule.

Toronto lawyer David Shiller, who is defending the bubble-blower in the original video, has offered to represent those facing legal action free of charge. Shiller said. “His (Josephs) case in a very, very real sense threatens peoples’ right to comment on the police conduct at the G20, and that is undeniably a very important and controversial public issue.”

The problem is much worse than a single police officer with an inflated sense of self-importance who considers members of the public to be unworthy of consideration; there is evidence the Toronto Police are actually targeting their critics, using heinous and illegal intimidation tactics. For example, sometimes the mere fact of starting a defamation proceeding scares people into silence and a powerful party can achieve their objective without the issue ever being decided in the court. The Toronto Police Association once proposed that anyone who filed a complaint against a police officer and his complaint wasn’t believed, that person should be sued. The bad publicity that followed the Association’s proposal put a quick end to that concept.

Litigation is a very expensive process which makes me wonder how officer Josephs can afford a case that can easily cost $100,000 or more. A Toronto police constable can earn up to $81,000 a year. The Toronto Police Association said it supports Josephs in principle, but its president, Mike McCormack would not confirm whether it was financing the suit.“He’s one of our officers, he was doing his job and his family is getting death threats,” McCormack said. “We support him and we support this matter; however, we will not comment on whether the association financially supports any of our members that are before the courts.”

This is a very interesting case and I will keep you abreast of any updates.