Quebec shock jock returns to airwaves on satellite radio

Shock jock radio host Jeff Fillion has signed a deal with XM satellite radio more than a year after his controversial exit from Quebec radio.

Fillion left Quebec City's CHOI-FM in March 2005 after he landed in hot water over comments made about TV weather presenter Sophie Chiasson.

A Quebec Superior Court ordered Genex —the radio station's owner —and Fillion to pay $340,000 for "sexist, heinous, malicious, unfounded, hurtful and abusive" on-air comments targeting Chiasson, which included references to the size of her breasts.

An appeal of the ruling filed by Genex and Fillion is still pending, as is an appeal by Genex to block the 2004 Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission order to close CHOI for breaches of the Broadcasting Act.

Earlier in the year Fillion launched his own website to make his morning show available to 7,500 subscribers.

"The agreement with XM Canada represents a unique opportunity to reach a broader audience," Fillion said in a statement.

"However, I have also chosen to work from my studio in Quebec, in close proximity to the listeners who have supported me through thick and thin, and who have enabled me to continue to work in radio."

Even before the Chiasson comments, Fillion had been in trouble with the CRTC for his controversial remarks, including his opinion that psychiatric patients should be euthanized and his view that African students at Laval University are the children of brutal dictators.

Fillion has learned from his "legal and regulatory misadventures," said Andre Di Cesare, vice-president of XM Quebec.

"All of this is now past history and he is excited to now serve a new audience on XM Canada," Di Cesare said.