2017 February 14

Singh v. Chandel, 2017 ONSC 1018

The Ontario Superior Court of Justice dismissed a claim for defamation and injurious falsehood although the court concluded the defendant authored an email which defamed the plaintiff. In rejecting the  defendant’s position that he was not the author or distributor of an email sent from a Gmail account, the Court considered the circumstantial evidence of authorship. This included the subject matters in the email and the vocabulary used. In addition, the Court noted the defendant had said nothing in his examination in chief about the email, the Court’s conclusions about his credibility and the fact the defamatory email was less than 4 weeks after an earlier Court order. The Court held that it was not persuaded that the distribution was sufficiently widespread to have any impact on the plaintiff’s employment. Although the judge noted that damages for libel are presumed, and at least one witness testified he actually received the email, the Court dismissed the defamation claim without finding the any substantive defences had been established.