Tri-City Skins was an Ontario-based white power group active from 1997 to 2002 in the Kitchener-Waterloo and Cambridge area. James Scott Richardson was the group's most visible member, and in October 2001, police believed that Tri-City Skins had 25 members in southwestern Ontario.[1][2] Some members of the Tri-City Skins were alleged to have engaged in a campaign of intimidation, assault, vandalism and other property crimes.[2] Some members have been arrested and charged with possession of illegal weapons and drug possession for the purpose of trafficking.[3]
Tri-City Skins operated a website that led to a complaint about its promotion of racial hatred.[4] The Tri-City Skins' website was hosted by Affordable-Space.com, which was the Internet service provider of Alexan Kulbashian (a.k.a. Alex Krause), former webmaster of the Canadian Ethnic Cleansing Team.[5][6] Lawyer Richard Warman filed a federal human rights complaint against the website and other named respondents. On March 10, 2006, the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal ruled that Richardson and Kulbashian were guilty of violating the Canadian Human Rights Act, and ordered the pair to pay $8,000 in fines and compensation. Kulbashian's Internet service provider was fined an additional $3,000. This case marked the first time in Canadian history that an Internet service provider had been found guilty of hosting a website promoting hatred against visible minorities.[5] A complaint against the Tri-City Skins organization was dismissed, since Warman failed to prove that the group existed outside of the website.[6]