Ford’s office asks city to remove NOW issue with fake ‘naked’ image

Saying she had been asked to do so by Mayor Rob Ford’s office, a City Hall custodial supervisor directed her colleagues Thursday to remove from city buildings all copies of a NOW Magazine issue featuring a computer-altered image of a shirtless Ford on the cover and a raunchier altered image inside. The issue hit newsstands Thursday morning. Lorraine Pickett sent the email at 9 a.m. to the City Hall security desk and to custodial managers responsible for other city buildings. It read: “Hi All, I have a request from the mayor’s office to remove all NOW newspapers from all City of Toronto locations/facilities ASAP. Please remove and dispose.” The directive was reversed in the early afternoon. But in a statement, NOW editor and chief executive Alice Klein said, “We are outraged. As far as I've heard, there's still such a thing as freedom of expression in Ford Nation.” Ford spokesperson Adrienne Batra attributed the incident to a “misunderstanding.”