Montreal man charged with inciting hate testifies in his own defence

A Montreal man accused of fomenting hate against Jewish people is testifying in his own defence.

Gabriel Sohier-Chaput, who went by the online moniker Zeiger, is facing one count of willful promotion of hatred in connection with a blog post from January 2017 on the far-right website Daily Stormer.

Sohier-Chaput, 35, told the court Tuesday he wrote between 800 and 1,000 articles for Daily Stormer beginning in 2016, including part of the blog post for which he is facing trial.

He admits to writing a portion of the January 2017 article that advocated for “non-stop Nazism everywhere” in order to upset Jewish people and “trigger” those he described as being on the extreme left.

Sohier-Chaput says he chose wording that was “exaggerated” and “poetic” in order to mock people who he felt were too sensitive and who branded those with whom they disagree as Nazis.

He denies writing other parts of the blog post, which he says were added by Daily Stormer founder Andrew Anglin.

The charge against Sohier-Chaput came after a B’nai Brith criminal complaint in May 2018 — the same month a series of articles in the Montreal Gazette described him as a prominent neo-Nazi figure in North America.

The Crown prosecutor will cross-examine Sohier Chaput later in the day.