Kamloops Mayor Reid Hamer-Jackson at a news conference on July 15, 2024.

(LEVI LANDRY / iNFOnews.ca)

A Kamloops developer responded to Mayor Reid Hamer-Jackson's lawsuit last week to not only deny defaming him, but to also double-down on an allegation that the mayor groped his wife.

It's Hamer-Jackson's second defamation case since he was elected in 2022, but the allegations he claims have damaged his reputation in this case appear to have first been aired publicly by the mayor himself.

The lawsuit claims local developer Joshua Knaak is an "outspoken and irresponsible critic" of the mayor and he "verbally published defamatory statements" on the night of the alleged groping and repeatedly afterward.

Knaak responded Aug. 6 and said the incident was at a downtown Kamloops bar and came after his wife bought a drink for the mayor.

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He said in his response that he introduced his wife to Hamer-Jackson, then sat at a separate table. Knaak's wife Nicole later bought tequila shots for herself and the mayor "as a gesture of kindness," according to Knaak's reply.

While at Hamer-Jackson's table, he put his hand around her waist to pull her closer, but moved his hand down to her buttocks as he did so, according to the reply.

She told her husband when she returned to the table.

Knaak denied repeating them or publishing them to others and denied that he is responsible for any re-publication of the allegations.

In Hamer-Jackson's version, Knaak accused Hamer-Jackson of "groping women on the dance floor" and asked the mayor to "keep (his) hands off her tonight." Although the statements were directed at Hamer-Jackson, there was a group of people in the area who might have heard, according to his claim.

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But, if the mayor's reputation was damaged by the groping allegation, it was a consequence of his own public statements, according to Knaak.

He quoted the mayor bringing up the incident in media interviews that followed Hamer-Jackson's initial lawsuit against Coun. Katie Neustaeter, in which he complained of being called a "pervert."

Despite accusing Knaak of spreading allegations that he had touched his wife at The Blue Grotto after the event, Hamer-Jackson said he doesn't know the "particulars of those further instances of slander and libel," according to his initial claim.

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