Press Forced to Pay Out Libel Damages of Over £700,000 as Media Pays Heavy Price For False Reporting of Terror Allegations

 

During the course of the last twelve months, Carter-Ruck has secured numerous apologies, together with damages totalling in excess of £700,000, for a number of Muslim clients falsely accused of suspected involvement with terrorism.

Most recently, the Daily Mirror was forced to apologise and pay damages to Abdul Hadi Awang. Mr Hadi Awang is a prominent political figure in Malaysia, currently serving as the President of PAS (a leading, democratically elected opposition party).  The Mirror inadvertently, but entirely falsely, accused Mr Hadi Awang of being a leading figure in Al Qaeda.

In another case, Amjad Sarwar, from High Wycombe, accepted libel damages totalling more than £225,000 (understood to be the highest total for a libel Claimant in recent years), following the settlement of complaints brought against a number of national newspapers as well as Sky News, ITN and Channel 4 News. They had falsely suggested that Mr Sarwar was a suspect in the alleged plots to blow up a number of British aircraft using "liquid bombs" in the summer of 2006. These attacks would, if successful, have constituted the worst terrorist atrocity in British history.  The newspapers all published full apologies to Mr Sarwar. In addition, a number of apologies were broadcast on ITV, Channel 4, Sky News and other television channels.

While the essential 'sting' of the libels - false allegations of involvement with terrorism - was similar in all of these cases, the precise nature of the complaints varied. For example, in Mr Sarwar's case a large number of media outlets chose to publish his name and photograph, thereby falsely linking him with terrorism. By contrast, in another case the complaint was brought on behalf of an entire family against Sky and Channel 5 news, which had erroneously broadcast footage of the family home in the context of a story concerning a police investigation into an alleged plot to kidnap and behead a British soldier. Despite the fact that none of the family themselves was named or even shown in the broadcast, the news channels were forced to broadcast very full apologies and pay substantial damages and costs to each of them.

The prevalence of these cases provides an alarming reminder of the frequency with which the media, no doubt in a bid to feed the 24-hour news 'agenda', can be prone to publish stories, even on matters of the utmost gravity such as terrorism, without adequate fact-checking beforehand. They serve as an equally stark, and welcome, reminder of the availability of remedies for the individual victims of these publications, and of the price which the media will pay for getting its stories wrong.

In all of these cases the Claimants were represented by Carter-Ruck partner Adam Tudor and solicitor Isabel Hudson.

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Winter 2007