Couple in unwanted spotlight

A Manitoba judge and her lawyer husband are facing an uncertain future after complaints about their past personal affairs were recently brought forward to a pair of judicial governing bodies.

The Canadian Judicial Council is currently reviewing the status of Lori Douglas, who is the associate chief justice of the Manitoba Court of Queen's Bench Family Division. The Law Society of Manitoba has also launched an investigation of her husband, Jack King, who is a family lawyer in private practice.

At the centre of the controversy is a Winnipeg computer programmer named Alexander Chapman, who first met King in 2002 when he retained him to act in his ongoing divorce case.

Allan Fineblit, chief executive officer of the law society, confirmed Tuesday that Chapman came forward in July with allegations of wrongdoing by the lawyer, claiming King tried pressuring him to have a sexual relationship with Douglas back in 2003. The offer was never accepted and there is nothing to suggest Chapman ever met Douglas, who was a private lawyer at the time.

"There's no statute of limitations on our ability to investigate. We will determine, likely by the end of September or early October, if we will lay a charge of professional misconduct," Fineblit told the Free Press.

Chapman claimed in a CBC-TV interview broadcast Tuesday that his former lawyer showed him about 30 nude photos of Douglas in an attempt to entice him to have sex with her. King had apparently posted the explicit pictures on an Internet website devoted to sex between white women and black men. Chapman, who is black, claims King was posting ads online seeking other sex partners for his wife, who is white.

King's lawyer, Bill Gange, told the Free Press on Tuesday Chapman is a "con and a liar" who used to go under the name of Lenard Quaccoo and was convicted in the 1990s of an arson related to an ongoing domestic charge. Chapman could not be reached for comment.

All parties agree that, shortly after his divorce was finalized, Chapman filed a complaint about King's conduct with senior partners at the law firm of Thompson Dorfman Sweatman. The matter was resolved quickly and privately when King agreed to pay Chapman $25,000 in exchange for signing a confidentiality agreement saying he would not take any legal action, would never speak publicly about the issue and would turn over and destroy all photos he had of Douglas. There was no suggestion King's comments somehow impacted how Chapman's divorce case was handled.

As well, King left the firm and took a one-year medical leave. Sources told the Free Press the law society was aware of the complaint by Chapman but took no action against King once he agreed to stop practising and seek medical help. Their only requirement was for him to provide a letter from a doctor stating he was healthy enough to return to work, which he did in 2004.

The law society only began an investigation this summer when Chapman went to them for the first time. Gange, King's lawyer, is furious that Chapman has breached the confidentiality agreement by approaching the CBC and providing the TV station with the lewd pictures.

"This is disgusting. It's a horror show," he said Tuesday. Gange admits King "shouldn't have talked to him the way he did" but has already paid a heavy price through the financial settlement and taking a year away from his practice. He said King was suffering through a major depression in 2003 and never told his wife he had asked Chapman to have sex with her or that he had shown her private pictures to him and posted them online. He said King and Chapman had a friendly relationship at the time, which included plenty of sexual talk and bravado from both men.

Gange also accused Chapman of attempting to "extort" up to $100,000 from King before agreeing to the lesser amount.

"I only recommended it to protect Lori, and his son. He was succumbing to the blackmail," said Gange. "He did something stupid and out of character, but it was not illegal, and it was never acted upon."

He said King and Douglas likely have several legal avenues to pursue against Chapman for breaches of the confidentiality agreement, of the Privacy Act for not destroying the personal photos, and for defamation of character. Both have declined to comment.

Gange believes Chapman decided to come forward because he falsely believes Douglas influenced a civil lawsuit he previously filed against the Winnipeg Police Service, which was connected to his previous domestic issues.

"It's complete poppycock," said Gange. He is urging the law society to dismiss Chapman's complaint against King on the basis it has no merit and deals with an issue that was already settled privately. He also has no idea why Douglas is facing any review at all, considering she never had contact with Chapman and the photos in question were taken years before she became a judge.

"Isn't this just wonderful titillation," he said sarcastically. "People are going to be sitting around and saying, 'Oh my, look what a judge did.' Well, this was done in their private lives."

Douglas was a partner at Thompson Dorfman Sweatman until she was appointed to the Court of Queen's Bench in 2005. She currently sits on the Canadian Judicial Council, which is the only professional body in Canada that can hear complaints about federally appointed judges. Federal officials say a typical complaint investigation takes about three months. Chapman filed his against Douglas in late July.

www.mikeoncrime.com

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition September 1, 2010 A3