Judgment on issues of meaning and whether defamatory.
As to the Chase levels of meaning: ‘They come from the decision of Brooke LJ in Chase v News Group Newspapers Ltd [2003] EMLR 11 [45] in which he identified three types of defamatory allegation: broadly, (1) the claimant is guilty of the act; (2) reasonable grounds to suspect that the claimant is guilty of the act; and (3) grounds to investigate whether the claimant has committed the act. In the lexicon of defamation, these have come to be known as the Chase levels. Reflecting the almost infinite capacity for subtle differences in meaning, they are not a straitjacket forcing the court to select one of these prescribed levels of meaning, but they are a helpful shorthand. In Charman v Orion Publishing Group Ltd, for example, Gray J found a meaning of ‘cogent grounds to suspect’
Judges:
Nicklin J
Citations:
[2017] EWHC 2637 (QB), [2018] EMLR 9, [2017] WLR(D) 719, [2017] 4 WLR 197
Links:
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Chase v Newsgroup Newspapers Ltd CA 3-Dec-2002
The defendant appealed against a striking out of part of its defence to the claim of defamation, pleading justification.
Held: The Human Rights Convention had not itself changed the conditions for a plea of justification based upon reasonable . .
Cited by:
Cited – Hayden v Associated Newspapers Ltd QBD 11-Mar-2020
The claimant alleged defamation by the defendant, and the court now considered the meanings of the words complained of. Another person had been held by police for seven hours after identifying the claimant as a transgendered man.
Held: The . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Defamation
Updated: 26 October 2022; Ref: scu.598440
