UofO Law Prof Sues for Libel

Denis Rancourt has a long history of legal proceedings with the University of Ottawa (UofO), where he was once a physics professor. He was in the news again this week for being named the defendant in a libel suit by Joanne St. Lewis, a law professor at UofO, over a blog post on Rancourt’s site, UofO Watch.

Tom Spears of the Ottawa Citizen provided background to the case yesterday,

The contention began when St. Lewis, as the director of the university’s Human Rights Research and Education Centre, submitted an evaluation of a student-produced report alleging systemic racism at the University of Ottawa. St. Lewis’s claims include that Rancourt’s blog “likened Professor St. Lewis’ evaluation to academic fraud,” and that he called her work “unprofessional, intellectually dishonest and lacking in independence.”

The statement of claim says Rancourt’s blog accuses St. Lewis of acting as “Allan Rock’s House Negro.” The statement says this means she acted like a slave, and “acted in a servile manner toward Allan Rock (a white male) and the University of Ottawa.”

It says the statement implies that St. Lewis “supports racism” and “lacks integrity.”

The initial blog post that started the controversy is still online and can be viewed here. The Statement of Claim can be viewed here.

Update – June 25, 2014

See an update on this case, and a perspective directly from the Defendant, here.