No happy ending for Jack Layton

From here:

TORONTO – What Jos Chiu remembers most is the sign. A long, red, illuminated sign with big white letters: MASSAGE. The sign was for years vertically attached to number 787 Dundas St. W.

It was a massage parlour, but no ordinary massage parlour.

It was the kind suspected by police as one of the many in the city where women were offering the “extra service” of masturbation — a place known on the street as a rub-and-tug.  It’s the same massage parlour where in January 1996 Toronto Police say they walked in on NDP Leader Jack Layton — then a Metro councillor — with his pants down — literally.  In a statement Friday night, Layton said he was there for a massage and that he was told by police he had done nothing wrong.

“It was a big vertical sign on the side of the building,” said Chiu, who has owned and operated a custom T-shirt shop across the street for over 20 years.

The question is, should anyone who is daft enough to go into a massage parlour that advertises its services on a long, red, illuminated sign and naïve enough to expect his protestations of innocence to be believed, be put in charge of running a country?

Perhaps, as his wife says, “Sixteen years ago my husband went for a massage at a massage clinic that is registered with the city of Toronto. He exercises regularly; he was and remains in great shape and he needed a massage.” Or perhaps Olivia Chow’s desire for vicarious power is sufficient to temper her outrage at her husband’s desire to graze in other pastures – publicly, at least.

7 thoughts on “No happy ending for Jack Layton

  1. Here’s the Toronto Star is saying:

    The Sun story relied on an anonymous police source who claimed to have discovered Layton at the massage parlour in 1996. On Saturday, the Ontario Provincial Police launched a breach of trust investigation into the disclosure of the information.

    Layton has said he was getting treatment from a massage therapist, unaware the location may have been used for illicit purposes, and was told by police he had done nothing wrong.

    It is from an anonomous police source – a source who appears to have released the information illegally. Not exactly lily white journalism standards on the part of the Sun, is it?

    Story is here:
    http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/983511–online-debate-more-about-smear-job-than-layton

  2. Why does that matter? The Sun is obviously in support of the Tories. The fact remains that the leak was from an anonomous source; the information was released illegally; and Jack Layton was not charged with anything (which he would have been if he had literally been caught “with his pants down”, as the Sun reported).

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