Blog Posts by Steve Mertl

Ginette Lamarche in Gaza (Radio Canada)Another CBC Middle East correspondent has come under the critical microscope of a pro-Israel group that implies she's guilty of biased reporting about the Jewish state.

The latest target is Ginette Lamarche of Radio-Canada, the public broadcaster's French-language service, according to the National Post.

A group called Honest Reporting Canada got Radio-Canada to issue a correction this week to an April 7 story Lamarche filed earlier this month that termed Israel's 2010 interception and boarding of a blockade-running Turkish ship as an "attack." An international review later deemed Israel's action legitimate.

Lamarche's story was about Israel's recent apology to Turkey for the incident, which resulted in the deaths of eight Turkish activists aboard the M/V Mavi Marmara.

According to Honest Reporting Canada, Radio-Canada has had to correct several previous reports by Lamarche and Radio-Canada's ombudsman, Pierre Tourangeau, had upheld 10 complaints against the reporter since the fall of

Gordon Stuckless is facing 11 more charges after two more alleged victims came forward to Toronto police. The last living scumbag who was part of the notorious Maple Leaf Gardens child-sex ring could be spending the rest of his ugly life in court or prison.

Gordon Stuckless, 64, was hit with another batch of sex charges this week, including one rare count of buggery, the National Post reports.

It brings to 40 the number of new charges related to his activities as an equipment manager at the old Gardens decades ago, resulting from more of his victims coming forward.

There is, of course, a presumption of innocence in these new charges, even for someone like Stuckless. But the fact he's a loathsome child predator is undeniable.

Stuckless was convicted in 1997 of indecent and sexual assault involving 24 boys from the late 1960s to 1988. The Toronto Star noted there were at least 572 separate incidents of molestation of young boys he'd befriended.

[ Related: Stuckless arrested on new sex assault charges ]

Stuckless, along with Gardens usher John Paul Roby and equipment manager George Hannah, lured

I wonder if the captains got out and exchanged insurance information.

Someone will have some explaining to do after a massive U.S. factory-fishing ship being towed out of Esquimalt harbour near Victoria somehow rammed a Royal Canadian Navy frigate docked at the adjacent naval base. Six people were hurt.

The HMCS Winnipeg had just completed an extensive refit and systems upgrade, when the 90-metre-long American Dynasty T-boned her near the bow Tuesday morning, The Canadian Press reported.

The huge trawler remained wedged in the warship's side, looming over the low-slung frigate, all day before being separated. Photos show a big bite taken out of the fishing vessel's bow.

Witnesses on a nearby boat recorded the accident on video.

[ Related: Trawler and navy frigate finally separated after collision in B.C. harbour ]

The Seattle-based Dynasty was being towed to the harbour's repair dock for regular maintenance and repairs when something went wrong, the Victoria Times Colonist reported.

"They

For a country that admits an average 250,000 newcomers each year, according to department stats, that adds up to a pretty long line.The Conservative government has trumpeted its 40-per-cent reduction in pending immigration applications but now we're hearing those who do come here and want to become citizens are also facing a longer wait.

CBC News reports almost 350,000 permanent residents of Canada are waiting to swear their oath of allegiance, according Citizenship and Immigration Canada statistics from last September. That compares with just under 190,000 in 2007, the year after the Conservatives took power.

For a country that admits an average 250,000 newcomers each year, according to department stats, that adds up to a pretty long line. The department says about 160,000 immigrants are granted citizenship each year at 1,900 ceremonies across Canada. So you can see where this is headed.

According to CBC News, the problem seems to be an increase in the length of time it takes to process "routine" applications. In 2008, applications took 12 to 15 months to pass through the system, according to department data cited

Is illegal killing of wild animals to harvest parts for black-market sales behind the death and decapitation of four West Coast sea lions?

Federal Fisheries and Oceans (DFO) officials are investigating the recent discovery of a headless Stellar sea lion washed up on a beach near Campbell River, on Vancouver Island.

"We’ve got another situation of a sea lion that’s died [and] that’s had its body parts removed, head in this case," DFO spokesman Paul Cottrell told CBC News.

It's the fourth such incident on Vancouver Island since late November. Three of the dead and mutiliated animals, apparently shot, were found in the Campbell River area, on the island's east coast, and a fourth further south near Comox, the Campbell River Mirror reported.

“We’re very concerned – we want to find out who’s doing this and put a stop to it,” Paul Cottrell, DFO's marine mammal co-ordinator, told the Mirror.

Sea lions can grow to more than 10 feet long and weigh more than a ton, so decapitating one would not

A case that experts hoped would clarify the rights of sperm donors in Canada has been settled out of court, leaving unclear the legal boundaries around the guy who provides his little swimmers and the parents who use them.

According to the National Post, the lesbian couple being sued by their sperm donor agreed to settle the case shortly before a trial was scheduled to begin.

Under the deal, the northern Ontario man who launched the suit, and his parents, will be allowed a one-time public meeting with his offspring, now two years old, but they can't reveal his relationship to the little boy or even touch him, the Post said.

The parties to the case cannot be identified because of a publication ban, though they were named in previous news reports.

The man launched the suit after having second thoughts about the agreement he'd signed promising to have nothing to do with the child he fathered. He also believed the biological mother, an acquaintance from childhood days, had reneged on her

Leah Parsons, mother of late 17-year-old Rehtaeh Parsons, leaves St. Mark's Anglican church with boyfriend Jason Barnes following her daughter's funeral in Halifax, Nova Scotia, April 13, 2013.If Leah Parsons gets her way, will they call it Rehtaeh's law or Amanda's law?

Canadians are about to have a discussion about the need for new sanctions against firing nude pictures of someone off into cyberspace without their permission.

Is a new law really necessary? Isn't illegal already, especially when the subjects like Rahtaeh are underage?

Parsons, the mother of Rehtaeh Parsons, who killed herself after a photo of her alleged sexual assault was distributed, will be meeting Tuesday with Prime Minister Stephen Harper to talk about just such a law.

"The meeting is specifically revolving around one aspect. It's revolving around changes to the Criminal Code," Parsons told The Canadian Press.

Parsons told CP she and her boyfriend Jason Barnes were invited to meet with Harper. Her 17-year-old daughter died earlier this month, three days after she hanged herself in her bathroom.

[ Related: Internet ‘trolls’ use cloak of anonymity to torment Amanda Todd in death ]

The young Halifax woman

The Edmonton Police Service released the premiere episode of their new web series The Squad on Friday. An Edmonton lawyer is challenging the city police's latest effort to engage the public via a slick online video series called The Squad.

Defence lawyer Tom Engel watched the first episode that went up Friday on the Edmonton Police Service's YouTube channel. He told CBC News he was very disturbed by the apparent abuse of police power and breaches of Charter rights he saw.

The series follows Squad Seven as "they confront crime and disorder in the city's west end," according to the police service's news release.

"When The Squad responds you know justice will prevail."

The slickly-produced 4 1/2-minute debut segment, which had more than 7,000 views as of Monday morning, shows Edmonton officers and a police dog combing the thick underbrush of the city's river valley at night for a screaming man.

[ Related: Immigrant advocates protest reality-show cameras along for CBSA migrant-worker raids ]

He eludes them for some time before stumbling into the arms of other cops waiting on a nearby road.