When a defendant claimed qualified privilege and the Plaintiff alleged that the words complained of were issued with malice, the defendant will not prevented from reliance on qualified privilege if it can show that the words have an honestly intended meaning without malice. The subjective intention of a defendant was an issue for the jury.
Citations:
Times 11-Nov-1998, [1998] EWCA Civ 1670, (1999) EMLR 530
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Skuse v Granada Television CA 30-Mar-1993
The claimant complained that the defendant had said in a television programme that he had failed to act properly when presenting his expert forensic evidence in court in the trial of the Birmingham Six.
Held: The court should give to the . .
Cited – Geenty v Channel Four Television Corporation and Jessel CA 13-Jan-1998
The claimant police officer appealed against dismissal of his claim in defamation.
Held: The words were capable of implicating the plaintiff in the neglect, they were also capable of implicating him in the accusation of maltreatment. The claim . .
Cited – Hinduja and Another v Asia TV Limited CA 25-Nov-1997
The procedure for determining whether words were defamatory was intended to be summary; appeals are to be discouraged. The new rule was intended to lay down a swift and inexpensive procedure in chambers to eliminate meanings which the words are . .
Cited – Williams v Reason 1988
An allegation that the plaintiff had broken the code of Rugby Union in writing a book for money was held reasonably capable of bearing the wider meaning of a charge of ‘shamateurism’ and hence evidence that the plaintiff had taken ‘boot money’ could . .
Cited – Bookbinder v Tebbitt 1989
The defendant charged the plaintiff with improperly spending andpound;50,000 on over-printing on local authority stationery the message ‘Support Nuclear Free Zones’.
Held: An attempt to plead as justification that the plaintiff had squandered . .
Cited – Toogood v Spyring 1834
Qualified Privilege of Bona Fide Words Under Duty
The defence of qualified privilege arises where the statement in question was bona fide and without malicious intent to injure: ‘In general, an action lies for the malicious publication of statements which are false in fact, and injurious to the . .
Cited – Heath v Humphreys 21-May-1990
The court considered the circumstances under which malice could be established so as to defeat a claim of qualified privilege. Malice is not to be inferred from the hypothetical untruth of a proposition derived from a misconstruction of a . .
Cited – Horrocks v Lowe HL 1974
The plaintiff complained of an alleged slander spoken at a meeting of the Town Council. The council meeting was an occasion attracting qualified privilege. The judge at trial found that the councillor honestly believed that what he had said in the . .
Cited – Lewis v Daily Telegraph Ltd HL 1964
Ascertaining Meaning of Words for Defamation
The Daily Telegraph had published an article headed ‘Inquiry on Firm by City Police’ and the Daily Mail had published an article headed ‘Fraud Squad Probe Firm’. The plaintiffs claimed that those articles carried the meaning that they were guilty of . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Defamation
Updated: 25 November 2022; Ref: scu.145149