Keith-Smith v Williams

In assessing damages for defamation, the court may consider injury to reputation and injury to feelings. Damages are at large, but the court must assess the likely extent of publication and the effect on the claimant’s reputation. Aggravated damages may be justified by the defendant’s conduct before and after proceedings, including persistence in defamatory allegations, refusal to apologise and contemptuous or oppressive behaviour. Malice may be inferred from that conduct. Where tortious publication has been proved, a prohibitory injunction may restrain republication of the defamatory statements and publication of substantially similar libels.

The claimant brought a defamation claim concerning repeated internet publications by the defendant. Judgment had already been entered in default of defence. The court therefore determined only the appropriate quantum of damages and whether injunctive relief should be granted.

The publications alleged, among other matters, that the claimant was a sex offender, sexual deviant, racist and Nazi. They appeared on an internet discussion group and later on the defendant’s own website. The central issues were the assessment of general and aggravated damages, and the appropriate scope of any injunction.

1. Damages. The publications were seriously defamatory. Although they were accessible worldwide, the evidence indicated that relatively few people had probably read them and that many readers were unlikely to believe them. That limited the extent of reputational injury, but did not eliminate it.
2. General damages in defamation are at large and principally compensate injury to reputation. The court may also take account of the claimant’s injured feelings, grief and distress. The claimant’s standing and reputation are relevant to the amount awarded.
3. Aggravated damages. The court may consider the defendant’s whole conduct from publication through the proceedings. Aggravation may arise from high-handed, oppressive, insulting or contumelious conduct. In a defamation case, malice may be inferred from persistent repetition, additional derogatory statements, refusal to apologise and continuation of allegations which the defendant cannot or does not seek to justify.
4. The appropriate total award was £10,000. The judge indicated that, if separate figures were required, £5,000 would represent compensatory damages and £5,000 aggravated damages.
5. Injunction. The criteria for injunctive relief were satisfied. A prohibitory injunction was granted, with a penal notice, restraining the defendant from publishing or republishing the identified libels or similar allegations that the claimant was a sex offender, sexual deviant, had been charged with sexual offences, had committed sexual harassment, or had Nazi or racist sympathies.