My colleague Bryan Baynham Q.C. has been taking to the television and radio airwaves trumpeting the civil lawsuit he has apparently brought against me on behalf of Coquitlam RCMP Cpl. Jim Brown as “the largest privacy breach case in Canada”.  To support this hyperbole, Mr. Baynham will have to persuade a court that a man who posted photographs of himself on the World Wide Web, on a website that describes itself as “the world’s most popular FREE social network for the BDSM, Fetish & Kinky communities”, had his privacy interests violated when the Vancouver Sun published its July 16, 2012 story about Cpl. Brown’s off-duty hobby.
This photograph appears on the website’s home page, as one of more than eight million photos reportedly shared there:
Cpl. Brown (who is not depicted in the sordid photograph reproduced above) was involved in the Pickton investigation almost three years before rookie Cst. Nathan Wells executed a search warrant on David and Robert Pickton’s Port Coquitlam property in February of 2002.  Cpl. Brown produced informant Ross Caldwell in July of 1999 and apparently conducted surveillance on the Pickton property long before Robert “Willy” Pickton was arrested and charged with 26 murders.  In our view, as counsel for the murdered women’s families, Cpl. Brown and his Coquitlam RCMP colleagues should all have been called as witnesses at the Missing Women Commission of Inquiry to explain why they failed to stop the largest serial killer in Canadian history.  If he had been called as a witness, Cpl. Brown could have explained whether his off-duty interest in “bondage, discipline, sadism, masochism, fetish and kink” had anything to do with the Mounties’ foot-dragging and inaction.
The Missing Women Commission of Inquiry just received another extension of time.  I wish it would use it to receive testimony from important witnesses like Cpl Brown and his coworkers.  Too many lingering questions remain unanswered.