On March 24th, at 10:51:31 AM somebody with the IP (70.53.21.88) who uses a dsl line with Bell Canada (sympatico Hi-speed edition!) and lives in Ottawa, Ontario stumbles upon the Bayblab. The person in question uses a windows XP machine, a screen resolution of 1280X1024 and Microsoft internet explorer 7.0. I warmly recommend to use firefox over MSIE 7.0 by the way.
At 10:51:45 AM He does a search on google.ca/blogsearch for "Canadian cancer research group"
At 11:00:29 AM He looks on technorati for who lists the bayblab as their favorite, come up with a name of a fan of the bayblab.
at 11:41:50 William O'Neil then sends an email to the yahoo account of the fan saying something like this: "If you don't remove all material concerning me or my company by monday March 26th, I will sue you for defamation". The crazy part is that the website was not even setup by that person so he's threatening the wrong person. I guess he has no other name to go by.
At 12:32:31 He does a search on the bayblab looking for "O'Neil". Too bad that name is never mentioned by us just quoted ad verbatim from quackwatch.
At 12:33:27 He puts an "anonymous" comment on the blog: "hey fuckwad! post a peer reviewed study demonstrating the efficacy of chemotherapy. goodluck...." Ouch somebody called me fuckwad, that's rude, my feelings are hurt. Yet another chemotherapy denier!
Geez thank god the internet is not anonymous...Somebody got his IP blocked!!!
March25th:
BREAKING NEWS, seems our admirer is not only harassing some of the OHRI senior scientists but is also trying to manipulate some of our employer (which is an offense under canadian law) and trying to get us fired by contacting Dr. Worton, the CEO of the OHRI. Little does he know that the OHRI's legal department does not care about this, and all he is doing, is angering people higher up.
Due to inadequate libel laws and lack of regulation of alternative medecine here in Ontario, quackery can prevail and free speech is muffled. I decided to slightly modify the post as a precaution. Just shows how antiquated the laws are in Canada and in the USA. Mr Oneil is actually operating his clinic within the law (or gray area), for the time being.
March 26th:
It seems Mr. O'Neil has nothing better to do than harass cancer researchers (from his work at 24.235.122.122). He sent another email this time claiming that he owns copyrights to his name and the name of his company. However according to Canadian law "Titles, names and short word combinations are usually not protected by copyright. A "work" or other "subject matter" for copyright purposes must be something more substantial. "
Links, Url and metatags are definitely not protected under copyright law in Canada. I guess this man just can't handle criticism by real scientists... how about you justify your claims Mr' O'Neil.
Has your method been published in any peer-reviewed publication? How do vitamins and amino-acids contribute to treating cancer and what is the efficacy? We'll gladely invite you to the podcast if you want to debate with real scientists.
Podcast
15 comments:
I guess that if you make your money by lying to sick people you really have to make sure that you squash all criticism before the truth gets to potential customers.
Putting all that hard earned money to suppress the Bayblab seems silly but I bet they have to maintain a vigilance on the net so the word doesn't get out.
I think O'Neil should have a discussion of his therapies and success rates on the Bayblab podcast. Email him back and ask for an interview. I know I would listen to that podcast.
The Dickwad comment is actually the most demafatory statement that has been made by anyone in this matter, according to Canadian Law.
Fuckwad my mistake.
I'm not sure what his problem is. I enjoy reading the bayblab every day. I don't always agree with the posts, but I enjoy the dialogue and understand that the posts are intended as the opinions of grad students or simple humor. Is an opinion or joke considered defamation?
Libel and Defamation are redundant terms.-Obviously no one (esp not a lawyer) proof-read this. Apparently when the truth is unprofitable it is desirable to impinge on "freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other media of communication."
This isn't the first time this guy has threatened legal action against somebody discussing his group. This guy has dealt with him, and he's pursued action against CTV for their W5 piece mentioned in the original post that sparked this whole thing (the W5 show can be watched in its entirety here.)
Wow. According to Peter Bowditch, who has a website denouncing the CCRG, O'Neil has used 44 different email addresses and names, most of them fraudulent, to send Bowditch 109 different threats of legal action, none of which have ever been acted on. He has also gone so far as to make threats against the man's life, and e-mail his family members making defamatory accusations. These aggressive threats to others just draw further attention to his own clearly illegal activities. Not to mention that I would never trust his medical advice.
Talk to Dr. Worton and see if the OHRI can hook you up with a lawyer to supply legal advice, if necessary. Also, be sure to document all the actions of your "friend" so that you may countersue for any breaches of Canadian Law, should the need arise.
He's got a good idea, though. Sueing grad students would be a great way to get income! They're opinionated, stubborn, and incredibly (17K/year) rich!
As posted on digg: Even though I hate bayblab because it has historically been anti-Jesus and anti-Mel Gibson I have to give it to them: getting sued means someone else than my trolling self is reading it.
I will however set the record straight: neither decades of painstaking and rigorous research nor a big fat placebo cures cancer. The only thing that cures cancer is your love for Jesus and Mel Gibson. If God wants you to join him and all his friends in that great strip club in the sky he'll make sure you'll show up on time for that lesbian show with "Cassandra and Cyndi".
So by asking you to remove the email, William O'Neil is basically saying "I'm going to threaten to sue you, but I don't want anybody to know about it." Am I misinterpreting this action? Or does he now not feel that a lawsuit is justified? Judging by what I've seen so far, is no more qualified a lawyer than he is a doctor.
OK, I'm am certainly not a lawyer, but a quick read of the Canadian Copyright Act lists 'fair dealing' exceptions to copyright infringement which include (but are not limited to) for the purpose of criticism or review and for the purpose of news reporting. So, to my untrained interpretation, those emails are fair game (as long as we quote the source and author).
O Neill did the same thing to me a while back - contacted my employer and made life difficult. My employer was naive enough to get worried about the bullshit legal action threat - but I don't work there any more :) Anyway the lawsuit never materialised...
I've been meaning to contact you about the CCRG for some time. With all the threats of legal action emanating from the Bill O'Neill camp over the years, I still claim to be one of the earliest recipients.
Mine came in 2001. My daughter was dying of cancer while following Bill's "treatment" when he relayed a threat to me through her or her husband.
Here we are - six years later - and the CCRG is still around despite its blistering exposure on nation-wide TV on a program that was judged by the Association of Radio-TV News Editors to be the best example of in-depth/investigative journalism seen on the medium during the year 2006.
Make no mistake: we are dealing with an eel here. He thumbs his nose at anyone in a position to regulate him: Health Canada, the various health ministries, Ottawa's Medical Officer of health, the various police forces, the Competition Bureau . . .
And he sues - or threatens to sue - the rest of us.
I've made in plain to Bill, nose-to-nose, that I won't give up; but I'm 78. That's why it's so heartening to see someone so much younger taking this guy on - and someone with a scientific background, too.
I'd like to meet you. We have a lot to discuss if you can find the time.
Patrick McDougall
Actually....threatening to sue somebody (anybody) is prosecutable under the (criminal) justice system for making/uttering threats....
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