Law360 Canada ( October 17, 2018, 8:39 AM EDT) -- Appeal by the defendants from refusal to dismiss a defamation action pursuant to s. 137.1 of the Courts of Justice Act. The plaintiff, Armstrong, was an incumbent candidate in a municipal election in 2014. He retained his seat as a city councillor. After the election, the plaintiff sued his opponent, her campaign team, and a local radio station seeking damages for defamation in connection with remarks made during the election campaign. The impugned comments were posted on Facebook and Twitter and suggested that the plaintiff exhibited a pattern of unethical and illegal conduct used to bully and intimidate others, which included a prior dated conviction for sexual assault. The defendants moved to dismiss the claim under s. 137.1 of the CJA. The motion judge accepted that the defendants' expressions were a matter of public interest. The motion judge concluded that the harm likely to have been suffered by the plaintiff as a result of the defendants' expressions was sufficiently serious that the public interest in permitting the lawsuit to continue outweighed the public interest in protecting those expressions. The defendants appealed....