Judge orders Sask. man to pay $160,000 in damages to revenge porn victim
CBC
Warning: This story contains disturbing details.
It wasn't enough for Daylan Heidel to upload nude pics and sex videos of his ex to internet porn sites with the caption "karma is a bitch."
He went further, sharing the woman's name and personal details, sometimes as a reward to other porn site users who agreed to re-post them.
One video would be viewed 1.5 million times.
Now, the Saskatchewan man has been ordered by a judge to pay the woman $160,000 in damages, the largest sum awarded in a revenge porn case in Canada thus far. For comparison, a Manitoba woman was awarded $60,000 in damages earlier this year after her intimate photos were distributed without her consent, and an Alberta woman was awarded $155,000 last year.
The federal government criminalized the non-consensual distribution of nude pics and videos in 2015. Subsequently, several provinces — including Saskatchewan — amended privacy laws to make it easier for victims to take civil action and sue perpetrators for compensation. There have still only been a handful of such judgments across the country.
Court of King's Bench Justice Krista Zerr found that Heidel's behaviour was "flagrant and outrageous" and "intended to cause [the woman] harm." Zerr concluded Heidel intentionally inflicted mental distress by maliciously posting the woman's name and personal information alongside her intimate images on porn sites in a way that "unleashed a torrent of degrading, humiliating and frightening content directed at [the woman]."
A publication ban protects the woman's identity. Her evidence before the court described constant fear and anxiety.
"I would search the internet at all hours of the night in order to find images of myself and report them so that they could be removed before others would see them," she said.
Screengrabs presented as evidence showed her images on 10 pornographic websites.
The $160,000 was for general and aggravated damages. The judge did not order Heidel to pay punitive damages, which are intended to punish the perpetrator, denounce his conduct, and deter others, because Heidel had already served a "significant jail sentence," said Zerr.
In late 2019, Heidel pleaded guilty to the non-consensual distribution of intimate images of four women between January 2015 and July 2019. He was initially sentenced to 18 months in jail. He later pleaded guilty to additional charges related to two more women from the same time period and received an additional nine-month jail term that he served in the community.
The woman who sued Heidel is one of the six victims.
"It's the first case of its kind in Saskatchewan, so it's important from that standpoint," said the woman's lawyer, Sean Sinclair.
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