English Court Allows Defamation Action to Proceed Despite Evidence of Low Readership
By Amanda Avila • February 12, 2009 at 2:24 pm
Author: Ranjini Acharya
John Alexis Mardas, a former associate of the Beatles, has won the right to bring defamation proceedings against the New York Times and the International Herald Tribune in an English court for publishing an article that described him as a “charlatan” who spread false rumors about the Beatles that may have resulted in the band’s breakup. Evidence in the case established that there were less than 200 hundred hard copies of the article published and approximately 30 hits of the story online. In allowing the case to proceed, Justice Eady of the English High Court held that the determination of “substantial publication,” in the context of online defamation cases, “cannot depend upon a numbers game, with the court fixing an arbitrary minimum according to the facts of the case.” Read more » about English Court Allows Defamation Action to Proceed Despite Evidence of Low Readership
