Resident being sued by Sudbury city councillor retains legal counsel

Greater Sudbury (file).

Anastasia Rioux, who is named in a lawsuit by Sudbury Ward 11 Coun. Bill Leduc, has hired legal counsel and says she was only exercising her rights as a resident when she made a complaint about Leduc.

Rioux filed a complaint with Greater Sudbury’s election audit compliance committee in 2023 accusing Leduc of violating Ontario’s Municipal Elections Act.

The committee decided that Rioux’s complaints warranted further investigation and tasked KPMG to audit Leduc’s election finances. That audit concluded he likely violated election spending rules.

It identified four areas where the Act was apparently violated.

The committee said the biggest issue is Leduc didn’t report five campaign expenses from a Grandparent’s Day event, which was held in September 2022. If those campaign expenses had been reported, the committee said he would have exceeded the campaign spending limit.

Under the Act, exceeding the spending limit forces a candidate to give up their council seat.

As a result, the committee recommended Leduc face charges.

Leduc then sued Rioux and Greater Sudbury. In the statement of claim, he accused Rioux of defaming him and said the committee was biased against him.

But in a statement to CTV News, Rioux said she was only exercising her rights as a citizen.

“As a citizen of Sudbury, due process was followed when I filed my complaint with the election compliance audit committee back in 2023,” she said.

Has a right to raise questions

“All citizens have a right to raise questions through appropriate channels when identifying alleged election breaches. I have retained Desmarais, Keenan LLP to answer to the frivolous and often erroneous allegations and look forward to a conclusion.”

In his suit, Leduc said Rioux’s actions were “reckless.”

“Defendant Rioux’s statements place Mr. Leduc in a false light by suggesting unethical and unlawful behaviour in his capacity as a city councillor and political candidate,” the lawsuit said.

“These statements were highly offensive to a reasonable person and were made with reckless disregard for their truth or falsity.”

The suit also accuses the audit committee of “deliberately engag(ing) in unlawful conduct in the exercise of their public functions.”

The committee “demonstrated bias” through its “undue reliance on the defendant Rioux’s unproven allegations,” the suit said.

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Greater Sudbury has acknowledged it received the statement of claim from Leduc’s lawyer and said it would be filing a statement of defence within the next few weeks.

It has pointed out that the election compliance committee is an arms-length group that the city does not oversee.

“The committee's processes and decisions are independent from city council,” the city said in a statement.

“Municipalities are responsible for the costs of the committee's operation."