TORONTO – A Toronto photographer and comedian accused of publicly posting racy photos of women online without their consent will not face criminal charges after agreeing to a peace bond Wednesday.
Ren Bostelaar‘s lawyer says that under the terms of the bond, his client is barred from contacting multiple women who made allegations against him and from posting photos on certain websites for a year.
Sam Goldstein says Bostelaar’s behaviour was “inappropriate but not criminal” and has brought on sufficient punishment outside of the criminal justice system.
He says his client has “suffered great shame” as a result of the allegations, and withdrawn from a lucrative book deal.
The lawyer previously said Bostelaar had apologized to several women whose photos he reposted online from sites such as Tumblr and Reddit without their knowledge.
Police launched an investigation in March after one woman reported that she had shared nude photos with Bostelaar privately and did not want them posted publicly.
Allegations from several women also emerged on social media, prompting Bostelaar to post an apology on his Facebook profile, which he deleted shortly afterwards.
In the post, he admitted to participating in discussions on the online forum 4chan that “included photos of women and their names.”
Some of the photos were “sensitive” and taken from other places where they weren’t meant to be seen beyond a specific audience, he wrote.
He denied sharing any images sent directly to him without consent.
Bostelaar is one of the people behind the popular Twitter comedy account Stats Canada, which has more than 600,000 followers. He was also involved in the blog BikeRackTO. Both groups denounced his alleged actions at the time.
“The thing to carry away from this is that nothing on the internet is private,” Goldstein said Wednesday.