Article content

An outspoken Ottawa judge who criticized a cancer-suffering colleague and another senior judge on Facebook has apologized and decided to retire rather than face a disciplinary hearing.

Ontario Court Justice Dianne Nicholas officially stepped down from the bench on Dec. 31. It was two weeks before she was scheduled to appear before the Ontario Judicial Council over remarks Nicholas said she inadvertently posted on the Facebook page of a local assistant Crown attorney in October 2012.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Ottawa judge to retire after Facebook post in which she mocked another judge with cancer Back to video

As a result of her retirement, the Ontario Judicial Council no longer has the jurisdiction to hold a hearing or discipline Nicholas.

“What I said was completely wrong,” Nicholas told the Citizen on Monday. “I regret it, I shouldn’t have said it, I apologized immediately.”

In the online post, Nicholas identified a fellow judge and regional senior justice by their initials and complained that one had given a woman a reduced sentence because she had a certain kind of cancer that “is hardly a killer . . . in fact the very same f’n cancer that (the sentencing judge) has herself… .!!!!”