by Chris Meyers Almey
Northern News Services

NNSL (May 09/97) - Fresh from this week's territorial court victory into a charge of breaking a court order, CBC North Radio has again broadcast the name of a sex attacker and one of his victims.

Within a day, however, the Crown opened a civil file in Supreme Court seeking an injunction against the CBC.

No further details on the injunction were available, but the RCMP confirmed that they are investigating Wednesday's broadcast.

The national broadcaster was found guilty last November of violating a court ban on publication or broadcast of the names. But the CBC won a second legal battle Wednesday involving the broadcasting of the names in a story about a coroner's inquest into the death of one of the victims, who hanged herself while in police custody.

In reporting on their case in two newscasts later in the day, CBC again named both the victim and the accused.

In the latest case, Judge Brian Bruser dismissed the charge, saying he is not bound by Judge Michel Bourassa's earlier ruling that CBC was guilty of breaking the original ban.

Bruser agreed with defence lawyer John Bayly that a coroner's inquest is not subject to the court order.

Bayly is also preparing an appeal of last year's verdict, which came with a $6,000 fine. The main issue, he said, is whether a publication ban applies to a dead person.

In May 1994, before the woman died, Bourassa ordered the names of a number of sexual assault victims in a specific case not be published or broadcast.

And in January 1996 a Supreme Court justice banned publication of their names after the woman hanged herself.

Bayly said the issue is complicated.

The legalities of the matter are that the court has to advise the victim of any such ban and this was not done, Bayly said, as she was not in court. In the second instance, the woman was dead when the application was made, so she could not be informed.

Bayly said one of their arguments in the appeal will be that proper procedures were not followed in the courts.

Most interesting will be a court ruling on whether a publication ban applied after a person is dead violates the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, Bayly said.

During Wednesday's proceedings, Bayly told the court that a coroner has no authority to order a publication ban. Rose, however, argued that a court order remains in effect until it is vacated or quashed.

Bruser noted the Supreme Court of Canada has ruled the courts are not slaves to technicalities as they once were, and called Bayly's defence argument "logical."