Tuesday in Vancouver, Dale Sanderson, Creative Salmon’s legal counsel, told B.C. Supreme Court Justice Laura Gerow that he is also planning on seeking special costs from Don Staniford’s legal team.
Those developments came during closing arguments and on the last day of a defamation trial between the company and Staniford, a former campaigner for the Friends of Clayoquot Sound.
Creative Salmon is suing Staniford for comments made in two June 2005 press releases.
A June 24, 2005 release questioned whether Creative was organic and chemical free after tests detected trace elements of malachite green, a cancer-causing agent, in a company fish. Calling the company a "liar" and "consumer fraud," a June 27, 2005 press release challenged company assertions that it had not used antibiotics since 2001.
Summarizing his closing arguments first, Sanderson said he needed to prove only that Staniford published the words, and those words were defamatory in their "natural and ordinary meaning."
"He tried to push the responsibility onto others at the Friends of Clayoquot Sound," said Sanderson. "Significantly, no one from FOCS stood up and said this was a corporate decision, or group decision, or they were my words. And that’s because they can’t.
Source: West Coaster