A Quesnel man convicted by a jury of wilfully promoting hatred against people of the Jewish religion is being sued for defamation by a former neo-Nazi skinhead now dedicated to countering violent extremism.
Daniel Gallant, a former Prince George resident now living in Kamloops, has also named Google Inc. in his lawsuit for allegedly refusing to take down a post from Roy Arthur Topham that seeks to discredit his work.
In his notice of civil claim, filed this week at the Prince George courthouse, Gallant says he left the Canadian right-wing extremist movement 15 years ago and is now a registered social worker who campaigns to prevent recruitment and radicalization of youth.
His work includes developing counter-extremist narratives and is commissioned to write a paper for UNESCO to initiate dialogue on how to "effectively creatively utilize existing laws" to combat the movement.
Gallant focusses on two March 2015 postings from Topham in which he claims in part that Gallant worked for "Zionist Jews who concocted a fictional narrative known as the holocaust," and is part of a "conspiracy of evil do-ers who are essentially terrorists."
As for Google, Gallant said the company continues to allow a posting about from Topham on a blog-hosting site it operates as well as continuing to make his website available, even though he's been convicted of hate crimes.
Gallant also names Monica Schaefer, a holocaust denier who was ejected from the federal Green Party for her views, as a defendant, saying she repeated Topham's statements and commented in support of them.
Gallant is now a law student at Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops.
Topham is set to be sentenced Monday in B.C. Supreme Court in Quesnel.
None of the allegations have been proven in court and the defendants have not yet filed responses.
