The cost of public incitement of hatred towards a Toronto man alleged to have held up what police known as a “terrorist” flag throughout an indication final weekend may very well be troublesome to prosecute and highlights the challenges of defining hate crimes, some consultants say.
Prosecution of the person police allege waved a flag related to the Fashionable Entrance for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) whereas marching by town’s downtown final Sunday will “be an actual uphill battle,” mentioned Barbara Perry, director for the Centre on Hate, Bias and Extremism at Ontario Tech College.
“The usual has been set so excessive for the prosecution of what we name propaganda offences,” she mentioned. “It’s onerous to say if a logo is, in and of itself, sufficient to exhibit incitement to hatred.”
“There have been a few different instances taking a look at issues like cross burnings and waving Accomplice flags, that type of factor, that haven’t been very profitable.”
No legal guidelines banning glorification of terrorism
As nicely, Perry famous that prosecution of the Toronto man can be difficult as a result of Canada doesn’t have laws banning the glorification of terrorism like some European international locations.
Toronto Police Chief Myron Demkiw advised CBC Radio’s Metro Morning that the 41-year-old man was charged for allegedly waving a flag of PFLP, which Public Security Canada lists as a terrorist entity. They are saying the group seeks “the destruction of the State of Israel and the institution of a communist authorities in Palestine.”
“The priority we now have and what we’re alleging is that this particular person displayed that flag and that [it] constitutes proof of an offence of public incitement of hatred underneath the Felony Code,” Demkiw mentioned.
Canada’s Felony Code does comprise some laws that prosecutes hateful acts. That features Part 319 (1), the place a person is responsible of public incitement of hatred if “by speaking statements in any public place that particular person “incites hatred towards any identifiable group the place such incitement is prone to result in a breach of the peace.”
Such teams would come with these outlined by race, gender, ethnicity and sexual orientation.
Underneath subsection (2), of Part 319, a Canadian may also be discovered responsible of the “wilful promotion of hatred” by “speaking statements, aside from in personal dialog, wilfully promotes hatred towards any identifiable group.”
In September 2023, for instance, a Montreal neo-Nazi who authored a whole lot of articles and a few podcasts within the far-right publication The Each day Stormer was discovered responsible of wilfully selling hatred towards Jewish individuals.
And in October 2022, the former chief of the now-defunct Canadian Nationalist Social gathering was discovered responsible of hate speech towards Jewish individuals for describing them as a “parasitic tribe” and “black sheep,” and claiming they management the media and Canada’s central financial institution.
Only a few hate legislation expenses laid
However James Turk, director of the Centre for Free Expression at Toronto Metropolitan College, mentioned there have been only a few expenses laid underneath the hate legislation provisions as a result of the bar is so excessive.
“Our courts have been very clear in regards to the significance of freedom of expression by public discourse, which is the center of democracy.”
Turk mentioned that he can be “very shocked” if waving that individual flag would qualify as hate speech underneath both of the Felony Code sections.
Based on Perry, there are a complete collection of court docket choices which have outlined hateful expressions, what constitutes hate speech and what constitutes hate.
One of the vital essential rulings was the choice by the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal in Warman v Cuba, by which the tribunal distilled the definitions of hate into the “11 hallmarks of hate.”
They embrace dehumanizing a focused group, portraying them as a strong menace that ought to be blamed for the issues of the world and calling for violent motion towards them.
Convictions troublesome to safe
Whereas Perry says there are definitions of hate in case legislation, they aren’t as clear in laws, making it tougher to safe convictions.
Getting a conviction for public incitement of hatred would imply that the Crown must show that these actions would seemingly result in a breach of the peace, mentioned Richard Moon, College of Windsor legislation professor.
“It’s not at all times clear how one establishes that,” he mentioned. “Normally, while you consider one thing like incitement supposed to result in breach of a peace of some type, there’s a form of immediacy, possibly even authority that a person has that’s prone to encourage others to take some form of violent motion.”
Within the case of the Toronto man, Moon says he’s undecided how the police would go about establishing that publicity to the flag resulted in a breach of peace.
“You need to present that there’s some severe threat of speedy violence on account of of this show of the flag.”