Good call! Ford gets wind of this impending lawsuit, thinks he's toast, gets blasted and then calls Towhey saying it's all over.
A little more about that first "conflict" case and how Rob's mind works. It initially came up because Rob wrote letters to "donors" under his Mayor of Toronto letterhead, not his own or his "private foundation" letterhead. This could have been investigated as a potential
influence peddling situation, Rob using his own personal private charity to front for him. He had a long history of including his City Councilor business card with non-city related business (Deco) correspondence and had been called on it by the Integrity Commissioner before.
Then why did Rob bring the issue back to Council to overturn his previous order to repay the "donations" right after Council shot down his budget? FFS it was only $3ooo. That council backtracked and let him off also makes little rational sense, but hey, I think they and Rob saw this as a token of "loyalty" to the Mayor.
The activist who brought the suit was causing a stink before the suit was launched. I remember the announcement from Clayton Ruby was when I first registered that this was serious. I can imagine Hotmail screaming into the phone something like "you could be thrown out of office" to Rob who'd gotten away with so much for so long and didn't "get" the
concept of "conflict". Then in Nov. 2012 the
judge found Rob guilty of the charge and
ordered him out of office under Municipal Conflict of Interest Act while commenting the penalty seemed harsh for the facts of the case but, under The Act, he had no discretion in the sentencing. Then in Jan. 2013 Rob won the appeal judgment on a technicality. Rob's takeaway from this - he got away with it! So in 2012 its all starting to fall apart for Hizzoner, and in 2013, after the successful appeal, the Crack Scandal explodes in the media.
So, who exactly is this retired judge Momma's friendly with? In Jude's current COI the Fords' current lawyer Tighe is a serious heavy hitter, I'm assuming politically connected. Will that case now proceed with just Doug present while Rob's indisposed, temporarily or permanently?
And I think Towhey's more than a little disingenuous in his memoire.