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Full-first-class exam question solution about Defamation, Study Guides, Projects, Research of Law of Torts

University of LeicesterLaw of Torts
Prof. Maribel Canto-Lopez

It explains all the important rules and cases, breaks down what you need to prove in a defamation case, and even talks about defences. It's the kind of answer that gets top marks because it's super clear and convincing, and was awarded a first class 1:1.

Typology: Study Guides, Projects, Research

2021/2022

Available from 09/11/2023

vittorio-contardi
vittorio-contardi 🇬🇧

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Question
The latest edition of The Rodent, the student newspaper, arrives on the LSE campus. The
front-page headline is ‘Suspected sex offender caught!’ To one side of the headline is a large
photo of Adolphus, a senior law professor at the LSE. In fact, Adolphus is not the suspect
described in the headline, as the detail of the story makes clear, and his photo is on the front
page only because there is a lengthy interview with him inside the newspaper. But a number of
students see the headline and picture without reading the story and think that the headline
refers to Adolphus.
In the interview published in the newspaper, Adolphus reflects on his career. He recounts how
Bugsy, the head of the law department when he first joined the LSE, ‘was an outstanding
scholar, which is all the more remarkable considering that he seemed to be drunk half the
time’. Adolphus is less complimentary about some of his colleagues: ‘the lecturers appointed
in the 90s were, without exception, unequivocally useless.’
The newspaper also has a section providing exam information for students. The date of the
Law of Obligations exam is mistakenly listed as 10th June rather than the 10th May. Relying on
this information, Cordelia misses the exam and, as a result, loses out on a lucrative work
placement she would otherwise have secured.
Discuss any possible claims that may be brought by Adolphus, Bugsy, Cordelia, and Dennis,
who was one of ten law lecturers appointed in the 1990s.
The Rodent and Adolphus
D made a statement which is defamatory
1. The message of the statement to a right-thinking person – Lewis v Daily Telegraph
(1964):
a. The statement referenced is the statement on the front page: which is a
combination of the headline ‘Suspected sex offender caught!’ and a photo of
Adolphus
b. There are two possible imputations that one may understand from reading the
front-page headline:
i. Seeing as the words are ‘Suspected sex offender caught!’ and right next
to it is a photo of Adolphus, a right-thinking person could reasonably
derive, on first glance, that Adophus is the mentioned suspected sex
offender
ii. Alternatively, those who have read the Rodent would know from the
contents of the newspaper that Adolphus is not the sex offender that is
mentioned. However, this requires greater knowledge of the statement
that one may not know directly from the first page.
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Download Full-first-class exam question solution about Defamation and more Study Guides, Projects, Research Law of Torts in PDF only on Docsity!

Question

The latest edition of The Rodent, the student newspaper, arrives on the LSE campus. The front-page headline is ‘Suspected sex offender caught!’ To one side of the headline is a large photo of Adolphus, a senior law professor at the LSE. In fact, Adolphus is not the suspect described in the headline, as the detail of the story makes clear, and his photo is on the front page only because there is a lengthy interview with him inside the newspaper. But a number of students see the headline and picture without reading the story and think that the headline refers to Adolphus. In the interview published in the newspaper, Adolphus reflects on his career. He recounts how Bugsy, the head of the law department when he first joined the LSE, ‘was an outstanding scholar, which is all the more remarkable considering that he seemed to be drunk half the time’. Adolphus is less complimentary about some of his colleagues: ‘the lecturers appointed in the 90s were, without exception, unequivocally useless.’ The newspaper also has a section providing exam information for students. The date of the Law of Obligations exam is mistakenly listed as 10th June rather than the 10th May. Relying on this information, Cordelia misses the exam and, as a result, loses out on a lucrative work placement she would otherwise have secured. Discuss any possible claims that may be brought by Adolphus, Bugsy, Cordelia, and Dennis, who was one of ten law lecturers appointed in the 1990s.

The Rodent and Adolphus

D made a statement which is defamatory

  1. The message of the statement to a right-thinking person – Lewis v Daily Telegraph (1964) : a. The statement referenced is the statement on the front page: which is a combination of the headline ‘Suspected sex offender caught!’ and a photo of Adolphus b. There are two possible imputations that one may understand from reading the front-page headline: i. Seeing as the words are ‘Suspected sex offender caught!’ and right next to it is a photo of Adolphus, a right-thinking person could reasonably derive, on first glance, that Adophus is the mentioned suspected sex offender ii. Alternatively, those who have read the Rodent would know from the contents of the newspaper that Adolphus is not the sex offender that is mentioned. However, this requires greater knowledge of the statement that one may not know directly from the first page.

iii. Therefore, the first imputation is much more likely than the second.

  1. As was in Lewis v Daily Telegraph (1964) , a ‘suspected’ criminal conviction is likely to contain the implied message that the person in the statement is not necessarily convicted of the crime, but has engaged in suspicious behaviour warranting police investigation into his/her actions. In this case, therefore, the title of ‘suspected sex offender’ implies that Adolphus may have engaged in questionable behaviour making others uncomfortable or has made an uninvited sexual advancement towards another.
  2. As required in s1(1) of the DA 2013, the message must cause (or is likely to cause) serious harm to C’s reputation. Bagshaw also provides that the common law position of Sim v Stretch of causing damage in the eyes of ‘right-thinking members of society generally’ is likely to be read into the legislative requirement. a. Thus, it must be concluded that the statement caused or is likely to cause serious harm to Adolphus’s reputation in the eyes of ‘right-thinking members of society generally’. Under Lachaux v Independent Print (2019) , various factors can be considered. i. Facts about the impact of the defamatory statement: It is unclear what the actual impacts of the statement are. However, we can infer that since ‘a number of students see the headline and… think that the headline refers to Adolphus’, it may cause discomfort amongst the students that Adolphus teaches, subsequently resulting in reports to the school and an impact on Adolphus’s career. The magnitude of harm to Adolphus is potentially large. ii. Size/characteristics of the audience: Since the Rodent is a student newspaper, it is likely the case that at least several students have read it, and possibly quite many depending on the reputation of the newspaper. This may increase the scale of harm. iii. Quality of publication: It is assumed that the quality of the publication is at least decent considering this is the ‘latest’ edition of the Rodent, and it is not the first. It is likely the case that accumulated experience of repeated publications has increased the credibility and quality of the publications. This may increase the scale of harm. iv. C’s reputation prior to the statement: Adolphus is a ‘senior law professor at the LSE’, which indicates a positive reputation prior to the statement free from any association to a criminal offence. Therefore, the positivity of his reputation prior to the statement substantiates the harm done by the Rodent’s publication.

Statement refers to C

  1. A right-thinking person who knew of C and his/her conditions would, upon hearing or reading the statement in question, thought that it referred to C – Newstead v LEN : Yes,

perused the newspaper previously, knew that the statement was misleading as it was, and decided to print/distribute it regardless with this knowledge, as this would fail requirement 1(a) of the DA.

  1. Offer of amends a. Though the question gives no indication, the Rodent may also have a defence if they offer to make amends under s2 of the DA 1996 to make a suitable correction of the statement (4a), publish the correction and apology (4b), and pay compensation if necessary (4c). If Adolphus accepts this offer, he will not be able to bring a claim of defamation against the Rodent according to s3(2) of the DA 1996. b. However, it must be noted that it may very possibly be found that this defence will not apply if the person who made the statement referred to the aggrieved party or was likely to be understood as referring to him (3a), and the statement was both false and defamatory of that party (3b). i. Considering how authors, editors, and publishers of the statement were likely to know after editing the newspaper that the headline did not correspond to the photo, yet the proximity between the two seemed to indicate that they were associated, they were likely to know that the message would likely be understood by the average reader who simply looked at the headlines to be that Adolphus was the suspected sex offender. Since this statement is both false and defamatory, a bar against an offer of amends as a defence will likely apply.

Remedies

If there are no defences, the court is likely to order

  1. An injunction to prevent further publication of the message
  2. Damages to remedy adolphus for the serious losses sustained to his character, and likely a higher degree of damages to vindicate him

Adolphus and Bugsy

D made a statement which is defamatory

  1. The message of the statement to a right-thinking person – Newstead v LEN a. The message likely to be derived by a right-thinking member of society generally is that Adolphus was jokingly claiming that Bugsy was drunk at times. ‘Seemed to’ indicates merely opinion. The use of ‘half the time’ clearly indicates exaggeration, so we can at most understand that Bugsy may have been occasionally intoxicated. But even so, Adolphus’s claim that he was ‘an outstanding scholar’ indicates that the message is overall complementary and is testifying to his academic skill.
  1. As required in s1(1) of the DA 2013, the message must cause (or is likely to cause) serious harm to C’s reputation. Bagshaw also provides that the common law position of Sim v Stretch of causing damage in the eyes of ‘right-thinking members of society generally’ is likely to be read into the legislative requirement. a. Thus, it must be concluded that the statement caused or is likely to cause serious harm to Bugsy’s reputation in the eyes of ‘right-thinking members of society generally’. Generally, it seems unlikely that this statement would cause serious harm to his reputation. 1) The statement is largely complementary. 2) The part of the statement (drunk) which may be defamatory was mentioned in a clearly joking and exaggerated manner. b. Under Lachaux v Independent Print (2019) , various factors can be considered. i. Facts about the impact of the defamatory statement: The defamatory statement is unlikely to result in any serious literal impacts because considering how Adolphus is currently a senior law professor and Bugsy was ‘head of the law department when he first joined the LSE’, Bugsy is likely to be retired right now. Since he is not professionally active, the LSE as an institution cannot take any measures for any past incidents. ii. Size/characteristics of the audience: The Rodent is a student newspaper. That means most of the audience is students who are entirely unconcerned with the head of the law department from many years ago. iii. Quality of publication: It is assumed that the quality of the publication is at least decent considering this is the ‘latest’ edition of the Rodent, and it is not the first. It is likely the case that accumulated experience of repeated publications has increased the credibility and quality of the publications. This may increase the scale of harm. iv. C’s reputation prior to the statement: Bugsy’s reputation prior to the statement was likely positive considering his colleagues’ view of him. However, the fact that much of Adolphus’ statement was complementary means that little will likely change after a mere joke.
  2. Therefore, because there is no serious harm, Bugsy’s claim will unlikely pass the first stage.

Statement refers to C

Assuming that the claim passes the first stage

  1. A right-thinking person who knew of C and his/her conditions would, upon hearing or reading the statement in question, thought that it referred to C – Newstead v LEN : Yes, title and name obvious
  2. Was the statement published to one or more people who thought it referred to C? Yes
  3. Would they have thought less well of C? No, probably not. Statement was complementary and defamatory part was a joke.

Sim v Stretch of causing damage in the eyes of ‘right-thinking members of society generally’ is likely to be read into the legislative requirement. a. Thus, it must be concluded that the statement caused or is likely to cause serious harm to Dennis’s reputation. b. Under Lachaux v Independent Print (2019) , various factors can be considered. i. Facts about the impact of the defamatory statement: The actual impacts of the defamatory statement are uncertain. However, we can infer that since a senior law professor has expressed doubts about the teaching ability of his colleagues, it may lead to increased student dissatisfaction and thus complaints to the department. This may therefore lead to minor and/or major impacts to Dennis’ job if the department takes this seriously. ii. Size/characteristics of the audience: The Rodent is a student newspaper. That means most of the audience is students who are indeed concerned about the quality of teaching by their professors and thus have a direct impact on Dennis’ career since they can voice concerns. iii. Quality of publication: It is assumed that the quality of the publication is at least decent considering this is the ‘latest’ edition of the Rodent, and it is not the first. It is likely the case that accumulated experience of repeated publications has increased the credibility and quality of the publications. This may increase the scale of harm. iv. C’s reputation prior to the statement: Bugsy’s reputation prior to the statement was likely positive or at least neutral prior to the statement, considering how he is still a professor at the LSE. The more positive his reputation prior to this, the greater the capacity for this defamatory statement to impact his reputation.

The statement refers to C

  1. Would a right-thinking person who knew of C and her circumstances would have, on hearing or reading the statement in question, thought that it referred to C? a. Defamation of a class: Based on the size and generality of the statement, is a right-thinking member of society likely to think less of C as an individual? i. Since there are only ten law lecturers that were appointed in the 1990s, it is indeed possible that a right-thinking member is likely to think that the statement referred to Dennis and thus think less of him as an individual. It is all the more possible that this is the case if Dennis is a particularly salient member of the group. Even if he is not, though, it is arguable that ten people is a small enough group that people could still think less of Dennis.
  2. Was the statement published to one or more people who thought it referred to C?

a. Since this was published to all students, it is likely the case that this statement was indeed published to at least several law students who may have thought of Dennis. However, greater evidence of this will have to be shown to maximise the chances of success for Dennis bringing his claim.

Communication must be made to another

  1. Can C show that D published a statement of him that was defamatory to a third party? Yes, spoken in an interview for the Rodent

Defences

  1. Honest opinion a. Was the statement complained of a statement of opinion? – s3(2) of 2013 Act i. Yes; the statement indicated a value judgment and not a fact b. Did the statement indicate, generally or specifically, the basis of the opinion? – s3(3) i. No, this part of the statement did not unless he further clarified the basis of his opinion further in the interview c. Could an honest person have held the opinion on the basis of (a) any fact which existed at the time the statement complained of was published or (b) anything asserted to be a fact in a privileged statement published before the statement complained of? – s3(4) i. Unsure, needs to be evaluated upon further information; in this case no d. Did D hold this opinion? – s3(5) i. Yes e. Based on current information, the defence does not apply

Remedies

  1. Injunction: D is not to repeat the statement that gave rise to the claim in defamation
  2. Compensatory: Compensate for damage to character and also to vindicate Dennis

The Rodent and Cordelia