In November 2000, I won the Governor General’s Award for Literature—Canada’s most coveted literary prize—for my autobiography, Notes from the Hyena’s Belly, the first book I published. Immediately afterwards, the freelance editor I had hired to tidy up the early drafts of the manuscript, Anne Stone, came forward claiming to be the actual author of the memoir. She took her case before the nation’s media. Taking up a stand against me, the National Post waged a media crusade the likes of which had never been seen in Canada.
The authorship dispute was relegated to a secondary position when the National Post obtained from Anne Stone an unpublished work of mine and reproduced pages of excerpts from it, deliberately distorted. The National Post maintained that the fictional murder plot in the unpublished manuscript was actually my unrealized plan to commit mass murder. The news dominated the headlines for months. In Canada, there was scarcely a major newspaper that didn’t report on it. The scandal got an even bigger audience when newspapers such as the New York Times and the Boston Globe picked it up. (I have given a detailed account of the media crusade the National Post waged against me, and of my legal battle, in my book Media Blitz: A Personal Battle.)
When the scandal broke, I had taken time off from my engineering job to concentrate on my writing. My book earnings were dismal. I could afford to forgo my regular source of income and devote my time to my fledgling career only because my expenses were small. I resided in a relatively poor part of Toronto, Old Cabbage Town, amidst a cluster of aging apartment buildings. The rental on my bachelor’s unit was scarcely $600 a month. And since I didn’t own a car or have any debt, I could survive on a little more than $1,000 a month. My savings could sustain me for a few months, but they wouldn’t carry me far in a major legal battle.
I couldn’t remain indifferent to the blazing scandal, however. At the suggestion of my publisher at Penguin Canada, Cynthia Good, I contacted the law firm Heenan Blaikie LLP. The firm’s good lawyer, Jonathan Stainsby, appeared unconcerned by my pitiful financial situation. I could afford to pay the $5,000 retainer fee the firm required—5 percent of the sum the lawsuit was estimated to cost, $100,000—but, as I told Jonathan, it would be a while before I could begin to pay his bills. “I will start looking for a job,” I told him. He jokingly replied, “You don’t have to go out to look for one just this minute.”
Although I managed to get back to work immediately after launching the libel suit, my financial situation remained dire. In January, the first invoice from Heenan Blaikie LLP arrived in the mail. For the month of December alone, my lawyers’ fee (including other lawyers in the firm) totalled $16,862.99. Since there was no way that I could pay even this one invoice, it seemed to me my legal battle had ended well before it got fully under way. And I admitted as much to Jonathan Stainsby.
He told me the invoice had been sent out without his knowledge. “This is no way to treat a client,” he said—and wrote off the entire $16,862.99! It was a singular kindness, the likes of which I would continue to witness during the twenty months that I dealt with him. It was not until June 2001 that my financial situation improved, with the sale of my second book, The God Who Begat a Jackal, and I was able to pay his bills.
On April 26, 2002, the case was settled out of court. Anne Stone retracted all the allegations she had made. She acknowledged that I was the sole author of the memoir and that the fictional murder plot in my unpublished manuscript was just that, fictional—as I had been saying all along. Her two co-defendants, Robert Allen, her former live-in boyfriend, and Michael O’Connor, also withdrew the false claims they had made.
As I prepared for the second phase of my lawsuit, against the National Post itself, I was faced with the unpleasant need to change law firms. In the twenty months since I first met him, Jonathan Stainsby’s fee had increased from $320 an hour plus 7 percent tax (GST) to $360 an hour plus GST. My engineering wage didn’t even cover the difference; my gross income had remained $30 an hour. And although my books continued to sell, the revenue they generated was modest.
Jonathan Stainsby had come to my aid during one of the most difficult times of my life, when I had little prospect of paying his fees, and when the outcome of my libel suit was far from certain. He not only fought a vigorous defence on my behalf but also secured the co-operation of his colleagues in writing off $25,000 in legal fees—including the $16,862.99 invoice. I felt wretched even contemplating replacing him.
But I was also aware that if I stayed with him, my financial situation would fast become untenable. With his fee increasing at double percentage points a year, in another three years, the time that I figured it would take for the case to appear before the courts, his rate would be in excess of $500 an hour. As his fee was increasing, my savings were diminishing faster than I could replenish them. I couldn’t continue to rely on Jonathan Stainsby’s goodwill to keep me in the battle. I gave him this reason when I advised him, on August 1, 2002, of my decision to retain another lawyer. Not surprisingly, he was not pleased, but I hoped, in time, he would come to appreciate my position.