The full report about Sarnia Police
Outlaw
******************************************************************
N E W S R E L E A S E
******************************************************************
For Immediate Release (Sunday, Sept. 11, 1994, at 1130 hours EST)
For further information, contact:
Robert Riley
Telephone: (416) 588-4676
Facsimile: (416) 588-3978
Internet: rri...@gold.interlog.com
SARNIA POLICE SERVICE VIOLATES PRIVACY
IN HOMOLKA PUBLICATION BAN VIOLATION INVESTIGATION
In response to a request under the Municipal Freedom of Information and
Protection of Privacy Act, the Sarnia Police Service released records
pertaining to an investigation which they conducted into a breach of
the publication ban in the Karla Homolka trial. These records were
inadequately severed to remove personal information of individuals
involved in the investigation (i.e., complainant, suspect, and others):
Thus, it is possible to read the information in full, including the
names, addresses and other personal information of those persons
involved in the investigation, despite the attempts by the police to
black this information out using a marker.
This is a serious violation of the personal privacy of the individuals
involved in the investigation. Further, this action on the part of the
Sarnia Police sheds some light on the investigative and intimidation
techniques used by police in such an investigation.
A transcript of the record is attached (including the personal information),
along with other relevant correspondence and information. It was my
decision to release the personal information via this press release,
as an example of the ramifications of lax personal information protection
policies and practices. This is a case which should be of concern to all
citizens.
Attachments:
1. transcript of correspondence from the Sarnia Police Service;
2. transcript of Sarnia police investigation report;
3. transcript of Sarnia police investigation report;
4. transcript of Sarnia police investigation report;
5. transcript of correspondence from Crown Attorney to the
Ont.Provincial Police;
6. copy of complaint to the Information and Privacy
Commissioner/Ontario.
Begin attachment #1
transcript of correspondence from the Sarnia Police Service
SARNIA POLICE SERVICE
Murray K. McMaster
Chief of Police
555 N. Christina Street
Sarnia, Ontario N7T 7X6
Tel. (519) 344-8861
Fax (519) 344-6001
September 2, 1994
Mr. Robert Riley
85 Dunn Avenue, Suite 2
Toronto, Ontario
M6K 2R8
Appeal No: M9400102
Our File No: 94-004
Dear Mr. Riley:
Further to our letter of August 18, 1994 and after further discussion
with Mr. Walter Richardson, Appeals Officer of the Information and
Privacy Commission/Ontario, partial access to the records you have
requested is being granted with the personal information of the
complainant(s), suspect(s), witness(s) and other involved parties
removed.
Denial of partial or full access to the following two remaining records
at issue is based as follows:
Exhibit "D" - Memorandum to all Chiefs of Police from
D.G. Evans, Assistant Deputy
Minister, Policing Services
Division, Ministry of the
Solicitor General and
Correctional Services dated
January 5, 1994.
Pursuant to Section 8 of the Municipal Freedom of Information and
Protection of Privacy Act (now referred to as the Act) exemption of the
Act applies to the record you have requested.
8(2)(a) A head may refuse to disclose a record, that is a report
prepared in the course of law enforcement, inspections or
investigations by an agency which has the function of enforcing and
regulating compliance with a law.
Exhibit "E" - Detroit News and Free Press article dated
November 28, 1993.
On July 5, 1993, Mr. Justice Kovacs, of the Ontario Court (General
Division), imposed a ban on publication in the trial of Karla Homolka
Teal. Among other things, the ban prohibited publication of the details
of the death of any persons who were mentioned during the course of
the trial. Copying and distributing this newspaper article would be a
clear violation of this publication ban.
We trust this will satisfy the requirements of your altered request.
Your truly,
(Original signed by John Freeman, Freedom of Information and
Privacy Coordinator)
John Freeman
Attachments
c.c. Mr. W. Richardson
JF/kjh
End attachment #1
Begin attachment #2
transcript of Sarnia Police investigation report
0105376-1: Other Criminal Offences on 11Jan94 10:00
At 130 Russell St. S., Sarnia
COMPLAINANT: Hamilton, Timothy
130 Russell St. S., Sarnia
General Occurrence Report: (Last Report)
Filed by 0066: Vandam R; 14Jan94; 09:10; Incident from 09Jan94;
00:00; to 10Jan94; 23:59;
On 11Jan94, I received a complaint from Mr. Tim Hamilton in
regards to a person attempting to upload details of the Karla Homolka
case onto a bulletin board service. Mr. Hamilton is the owner of the
computer store at 130 Russell St. S., Ph.# 383-6697. He says he
thinks he knows who the person may be and that this person used to
operate a computer bulletin board service and would have access to the
names and passwords of former subscribers to his bulletin board
service. Hamilton states that the uploaded Homolka details have been
added several times using different user names and passwords each
time. At least two different bulletin board services were accessed.
These bulletin boards are operated locally by private individuals.
At 1430 hrs, I spoke to Mr. John Vidler, 613 Errol Rd. W., Sarnia
332-4713, who brought in a printout of the uploaded document that
Hamilton told me about. He picked to (sic) document up from
Hamilton ad (sic) advised me that Hamilton had received that specific
copy from a Mr. Bill Long, and associate of Hamilton's. Long had
received that copy on his bulletin bord (sic) on the previous evening,
10Jan1994. Vidler said that he had also received at least two copies of
exactly the same data on the weekend of 09Jan1994 and that he had
deleted both of them as soon as they were located. Vidler, Hamilton
and Long discussed these incidents and because of the various names
and passwords used, came to the conclusion that their suspect was
Jamie Baillie, about 22 yrs old, who goes to Lambton College. At this
time they have no further evidence to support their suspicions.
The document itself is titled as follows:
HOMOLKA.TXT Tuesday, December 28, 1993 8:07am Page 1
Detroit News and Free Press article (adapted from the Washington
Post)
Date: Sunday, November 28, 1993
The article then appears to be a verbatim transcript of the newspaper
article, except for numerous typos and spelling mistakes. It includes
references to Tami Homolka and some descriptions of the physical
injuries inflicted on Leslie Mahafy and the existence of explicit
videotapes made by the Teale's.
I discussed this with S/Sgt Ogilvie and S/Insp Weiss and then
contacted Detective Mike Kershaw at the Niagara Regional Police
Task Force Office. Kershaw then refered (sic) me to D/Insp. Frank
Rider at O.P.P. C.I.B. who I subsequently did contact at 1545 hrs.
Rider was going to contact the Crown Attorney's office and call me
back with further advise on how to proceed.
This investigation is continuing. At this point I have not yet identified
the suspect Jamie Baillie.
*** END OF REPORT ***
transcript of Sarnia Police investigation report
0105376-1: Other Criminal Offences on 11Jan94 10:00
At 130 Russell St. S., Sarnia
COMPLAINANT: Hamilton, Timothy
130 Russell St. S., Sarnia
Supplementary Report: (Last Report)
Filed by 0066; Vandam R; 21Jan94; 08:51; Incident from 09Jan94;
00:00; to 10Jan94; 23:59;
On 14Jan94, I sent a fax copy of the uploaded Homolka article, along
with a copy of my report to date to the attention of D/Insp. Frank
Ryder, O.P.P. C.I.B. I also had a conversation with Ryder who
indicated that the provincial Crown Attorney, Paul Taylor is
suggesting that the position of the Crown is compliance with the ban
rather than enforcement. It was suggested that if the suspect could be
identified and convinced to comply, then the purpose of the
investigation would be fulfilled.
Subsequent investigation identified the suspect as Jamie Baillie, d.o.b.
07Oct72, living with his parents at 512 Talfourd St., Sarnia, ph.#344-
8710.
On 19Jan94, I contacted Mrs. Bonnie Baillie, mother of the suspect
and requested that she come in to the police station to see me about
Jamie. At 1620 hrs, she and her husband, Gary Baillie attended at the
station to see me. I took them to the interview room and discussed
with them the publication ban and some of my information identifying
Jamie as the suspect. They admitted that Jamie likes computers and
that he used to have a bulletin board service at their house, but that
they made him give up the service and his telephone line because of his
excessive telephone bills. He still has a modem and is allowed to
occasionally use it on their telephone line. She indicates that it is
possible that he still uses it after midnight, because they are usually
asleep by then. Mr. and Mrs. Baillie both indicated that Jamie was
busy in school all day Thursday but that he would be available to see
me Friday morning. They stated that they would not talk to him about
this before he saw me.
However, on Thurs., 20Jan94, Jamie Baillie came up to see me at the
Provincial Court building, indicating that his parents had talked to him
and told him to come and see me. I advised him to come and see me at
the station after lunch. At 1420hrs, on 20Jan94, I met Jamie Baillie at
the front desk of the station and escorted him to the interview room. I
told him that he was not under arrest and asked him why he had come
to see me. He indicated that his parents had told him I wanted to talk
to him about the Homolka ban and his computer. I asked him what he
wanted to tell me about it and he said that he had put it on. I asked
him what he meant by that and he said "the banned information".
During the ensuing discussion, Jamie admitted that he had received the
information initially from a friend who gave it to him on a disk. He
did not want to identify the friend. He admitted that he had uploaded
the information a number of times on different local bulletin boards
and that he had used the names and passwords of persons who had
formerly subscribed to his bulletin board last year. Among the bulletin
board services he uploaded to were:
"Insomnia" run by Bill Long;
"Ku Hi and the Bacon Thieves", run by Mason Vye;
"Late Night Diversions", run by John Vidler
"Spilled Toxins", run by Tim Hamilton;
"Border City", run by Greg Douglas, and possibly one or two others
that he could not immediately remember. He stated that he was aware
of the file existing under two different names: "HOMOLKA.TXT"
and "BIGCASE.ZIP", and that everybody knew what the two names
meant. He had seen it on the Lambton College computers before
Christmas, but could not find it there now. Jamie is a person who can
be described as a very slow learner or as border-line mentally
challenged. He seems like the type of person who is very easily led
and who would do almost anything to be popular or to be liked by
others. Jamie was convinced by his parents that if he did not come in
and tell me the truth about this investigation, that I would come to his
house and take away his computer and his modem and his files and
that he would never get them back. I allowed him to continue to
believe that. I warned Jamie that if I ever found out that he had
uploaded the information again, that I would get a search warrant and
come and seize his computer. Jamie fully believes this and promised
me most convincingly that it would never happen again.
Jamie is in his second semester at Lambton College where he is taking
a computer programmer analyst course and says that he is passing the
course. Although he does appear to have learning difficulties, he does
appear to be very up to date on computers and how they work, and was
easily able to describe to me the process by which he believed that Bell
Canada could trace the telephone accesses to the bulletin boards.
I advised Jamie that he was not going to be charged with anything in
this case as long as it never happened again and that his name would
not be made public.
I feel that this resolution is appropriate and that no further problems
will be forthcoming from Jamie. This investigation can be considered
complete and will be cleared otherwise.
PERSONS INVOLVED:
Baillie, Jamie Male d.o.b. 07Oct1972 Age: 21 (Suspect)
513 Talfourd St., Sarnia, Ont.
Hamilton, Wayne Timothy Male d.o.b. 10Mar1955 Age: 38
(Complainant)
130 Russell St. S., Sarnia, Ont.
transcript of Sarnia Police investigation report
Marked: CLASSIFIED and CONFIRMED
INCIDENT SUMMARY
*I501001 First Page Retrieved Successfully
*0105376-1: Other Criminal Charges on 11Jan94 10:00
At 130 Russell St. S., Sarnia
COMPLAINANT: Hamilton, Wayne
At 130 Russell St. S., Sarnia
SUPPLEMENTARY REPORT: (Last Report)
Filed by 0066; Vandam R; 08Feb94; 10:15; Incident from 09Jan94;
00:00; to 10Jan94; 23:59
On 08Feb94, I had a telephone conversation with D/Insp. Frank Ryder
of O.P.P. C.I.B. regarding the resolution of this investigation. He
indicated that he had received a letter from Paul Taylor, of the
provincial Crown's office indicating that the Crown was satisfied that
"While Mr. Baillie's behaviour cannot be condoned, I am satisfied that
the action taken by the investigating officer and Mr. Baillie's parents
appear to have fully dealt with the problems. To proceed further in my
view, is not necessary and there is no public interest that could be
served on launching a prosecution."
A copy of the full letter was faxed to me and is on file. This
investigation will remain complete and cleared otherwise.
transcript of correspondence from Crown Attorney to the O.P.P.
Ministry of the Attorney General
Crown Attorney
7765 Hurontario Street
P.O. Box 548
Brampton, Ontario
L6V 2L7
January 26th, 1994
Inspector Frank Ryder
Ontario Provincial Police
No. 5 District Headquarters
100 Bloomington Road West
Box 2500
Aurora, Ontario
L4G 6J8
Dear Inspector Ryder:
Re: Alleged Violation of the Homolka ban
Suspect: Jamie Baillie
I have reviewed the incident reports prepared by the Sarnia City Police
in this matter. Quite clearly, the material that Mr. Baillie attempted to
place on the computer billboard is in violation of the ban on
publication that was imposed by Mr. Justice Kovacs in the trial of
Karla Bernardo Teale. The efforts of Mr. Baillie to have this material
placed on the billboard may be seen as an attempt to publish if publish
is given its plain meaning of making known to the public. If this
analysis is correct, there would appear to be reasonable and probable
grounds to believe that Mr. Baillie has committed the offence of
attempting to violate a lawful order of a Court.
The matter, of course, has to be assessed as to whether it is in the
public interest to prosecute Mr. Baillie. The supplementary report
provided by Constable Van Dam provides a great deal of assistance in
this regard. It appears that Mr. Baillie is a somewhat sad individual
who was attempting to ingratiate himself with his peers. The activity
does not appear to be a deliberate attempt to be disrespectful towards
the Order of Justice Kovacs or motivated out of commercial gain.
Given Mr. Baillie's mental status and the cooperation that he and his
family provided to Constable Van Dam, I believe that Constable Van
Dam's action of issuing a warning is appropriate under all the
circumstances. While Mr. Baillie's behaviour cannot be condoned, I
am satisfied that the action taken by the investigating officer and Mr.
Baillie's parents appear to have fully dealt with the problems. To
proceed further in my view, is not necessary and there is no public
interest that could be served on launching a prosecution. If I can be of
any further assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me.
Yours very truly,
(Signed)
Paul. M. Taylor
Crown Attorney
PMT:dv
copy of complaint to the Information and Privacy Commissioner/Ont.
September 10, 1994
FAX
Mr. Tom Wright
Information and Privacy Commissioner/Ontario
80 Bloor Street West, Suite #1700
Toronto, ON
Dear Mr. Wright:
RE: SARNIA POLICE SERVICE (THEIR FILE NO. 94-004)
IPC APPEAL NO. M9400102
Please accept this correspondence as my official request for you to
commence an investigation into the collection, retention, and usage
policies and practices of the Sarnia Police Service.
Earlier this year a request was made by Ms Tina Louise Forgit of
Toronto. I was appointed, by Ms Forgit, representative in this matter.
The request was made to the Sarnia Police Service, and was for:
"Copies of any and all information; be that information held
in written, electronic, or other format; and/or held at any
office/detachment of your service; and/or held in any
information file/database; which pertains to any
investigation which may or may not have been conducted
into any real or potential breach of the publication ban in
the Karla Homolka trial."
The original response from the Sarnia Police Service, was to deny
access to all relevant information. This decision was appealed to the
Information and Privacy Commission, and during mediation it was
agreed that the Sarnia Police Service would provide me with copies of
the relevant information, with all personal identifiers severed.
On September 7, 1994, I received the requested records from the
Sarnia Police Service. I was shocked, and outraged as a citizen
concerned with matters of personal privacy, to discover that I could
easily read through the ink which the police had used to attempt to
cover the personal information that was to be severed from the records.
I am able to read, almost precisely, all the information contained in the
police occurrence reports and the letter from the Crown Attorney,
which were provided to me by the Sarnia Police Service: This
includes the personal information of several individuals.
I have attached a transcript of what I am able to read from the records
provided to me by the Sarnia Police Service. Based on this I ask that
you undertake an immediate investigation into this matter, with a view
to ensuring that practices within the Sarnia Police are changed such
that a similar incident can not and will not occur. As well, I think it
imperative that the Sarnia Police Service contact the persons identified
in the attached, and advise them of this breach of their privacy.
Actual copies of the information in this case are held by Mr. Walter
Richardson, Appeals Officer at your office: Thus, I am not forwarding
actual copies to you at this time.
Please do not hesitate to contact me directly at any time during your
investigation, should you require further information or representations
from me.
Thank you for your continued assistance in matters of access to
information and protection of privacy.
Sincerely,
Robert Riley
c.c. Hon. Bob Rae
Premier of Ontario
Hon. David Christopherson
Solicitor General of Ontario, and Minister of Correctional
Services
Mr. Tony Ruprecht
M.P.P., Parkdale
Ms Lyn McLeod
M.P.P., Leader of the Liberal Party of Ontario
Mr. Michael Harris
M.P.P., Leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of
Ontario
Police Complaints Commissioner/Ontario
Distributed to news media, and posted to Usenet newsgroups
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
To find out more about the anon service, send mail to he...@anon.penet.fi.
Due to the double-blind, any mail replies to this message will be anonymized,
and an anonymous id will be allocated automatically. You have been warned.
Please report any problems, inappropriate use etc. to ad...@anon.penet.fi.