6 months of silence from Sudbury CAS after privacy breach sees judge suspended

The Sudbury Children's Aid Society remains silent on how a confidentiality breach led to the suspension of a local judge.

It's been six months since Justice JohnKeastwas disciplined for what the Ontario Judicial Council called "conduct that could be perceived as demonstrating bias."

A series of text messages with long-time friend and children's aid employee Lynda Cullainwere the basis for a disciplinary hearing against Keastheld in November.

In those texts,Keastobtains confidential information about a child protection case involving a woman andher daughter, who cannot be named under a publication ban imposed by the Ontario Judicial Council.

Keastis also highly critical in the text messagesof the SudburyCASand individual staff members, on top of advising his friend to sue the organization.

Following the disciplinary hearing,afour-person panel suspended him for 30 days, which is the stiffest penalty available other than being removed from the bench.

No response from CAS on privacy breach

Keastalso agreed to not hear any cases involving the Sudbury children's aid for a full year.

But since then, Children's Aid Society of the Districts of Sudbury and Manitoulinhas refused or ignoredCBC'srepeated requests over the last six months to comment on this case

That includes answering questions on how this leak of confidential information was handled by the organization.

Cullainfaced her own disciplinary proceeding last year.

She was found guilty of professional misconduct by the Ontario College of Social Workers for providing confidential information about a client to a personal friend and resigned her membership.

When theCBCcalled the SudburyCASand asked forCullain, the receptionist said she no longer works there.