Switched has a new home! Huffpost Tech.

Click here to visit the new home of Switched!

Hot on HuffPost Tech:

See More Stories
AOL Tech

YouTube Commenter Sued For Ribbing 'Officer Bubbles' Reveals Identity

by Matthew Zuras on October 21, 2010 at 12:20 PM

adam josephs You may have seen this clip of Toronto Police Const. Adam Josephs threatening G20 protester Courtney Winkels for blowing bubbles at a rally in June. The young woman puts her bubbles away after Josephs forcefully tells her, "If the bubble touches me, you're going to be arrested for assault." (She was, nevertheless, arrested shortly later.) The video hit YouTube back in July, and Josephs immediately became the target of commenters, who dubbed him "Officer Bubbles" in a series of parody cartoons that have since been removed from the site. Having gained no sense of levity from the protest itself, Josephs is now suing Google to reveal the names of 24 people who mocked him online.

One of those anonymous commenters, who goes by the handle "Pussymcfats" on YouTube, has revealed his identity to the Star after finding a $1.2 million suit in his email. Todd Mara, a 33-year-old married Ontario native and father of two, tells The Star that he hasn't used his YouTube account in months and had forgotten about his comment. He was thrown by the allegation in Josephs' statement that the comments are "false and devastatingly defamatory," and the officer's lawyer, James Zibarras, claiming that they encouraged an "aggressive backlash that was turning into violent threats." What was the substance of Mara's "threatening" comment? "Officer bubbles probably looks at himself in the mirror a lot."


"Now all of a sudden, Officer Bubbles is back in my life," Mara tells the Star. "I don't know why this guy wants to draw more attention to himself. I can't figure it out. It's ridiculous." Mara stands by his comment nonetheless, saying that Josephs was "out of line" for using his authority in such an abusive manner -- but he doesn't think that Josephs should be mocked forever, either. "I was done with this in June. I left my comment and never thought about it again."

Zibarras told the Star that the case may be dropped since the parody videos have been deleted. Still, we'd almost like to see this case go to court, since YouTube is named as a defendant for simply hosting the videos. We're sure they have a team of rabid lawyers on retainer for just this kind of thing.

Tags: adam josephs, AdamJosephs, google, lawsuit, officer bubbles, OfficerBubbles, protest, todd mara, ToddMara, top, toronto, web, youtube

Comments

2

HuffPost AOL Social News Most Popular