2011 December 21

Saputo inc. v. Petkov, 2011 QCCS 6885

The Quebec Superior Court granted a permanent injunction prohibiting the defendant from disseminating defamatory expression contained in an email dated October 29, 2009 and in a communique dated 31 July 2009. The October 29, 2009 email, which had previously been sent to ten employees of the corporate plaintiff, called for a boycott of the corporate plaintiff’s products. The defamatory communique warned that “millions of emails containing the communique” would be transmitted to businesses in the Montreal area if the defendant came to harm. On November 3, 2009, the court had issued a temporary, pre-trial injunction prohibiting the defendant from disseminating the contents of the communique. In June, 2010, the defendant had been found guilty of contempt of court for violating the temporary injunction because of transmissions in January 2010 (to investment and retirement funds, the media and store managers) and in February 2010 (to participants in a breakfast organized by the Montreal Chamber of Commerce.)

The new, permanent injunction ordered the defendant not to disseminate, print, publish or circulate in any manner, verbally or in writing, by email or in any other medium, the defamatory words contained in the email or the communique, or analogous words, in whole or in part. The Court also specifically authorized the plaintiffs to communicate this judgment to anyone who had received a copy of the defamatory email or communique.