Vancouver broadcaster Jody Vance sues online harasser

Vancouver broadcaster Jody Vance is suing a man who earlier this month pleaded guilty to criminal harassment in connection with hundreds of abusive and threatening emails and online posts.

In a civil claim filed in B.C. Supreme Court Thursday, Vance and a guest she interviewed—social media expert Jesse Miller— allege Richard Sean Oliver engaged in “an ongoing and relentless campaign” of harassment, infliction of mental suffering, invasion of privacy and defamation from March 2020 to September 2021. However, Vance told Postmedia the harassment began many years before 2020.

The suit contends the abuse included hundreds of emails and online posts that contained language of a threatening and terrorizing nature. They claim he also threatened and harassed colleagues, friends, and guests of Vance through similar emails or online posts, and made up fake emails from other people designed to “demean, sexualize, offend and upset.”