Justice Tugendhat says the four hyperlinked articles should be used by the court to help it decide on the meaning of the allegedly defamatory article
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Hyperlinked articles will be considered as context in a defamation case currently being brought against the Spectator and its journalist Stephen Pollard.
Lawyers for the defendents have argued that the content hyperlinked to in the allegedly defamatory article makes it clear that the piece does not refer to the claimant, Islam Expo Ltd. In a ruling last week , Justice Tugendhat says the four hyperlinked articles should be used by the court to help it decide on the meaning of the allegedly defamatory article.
"It is a principle of law most recently defined in Charleston v. Newsgroup Newspapers Limited [1985] 2 AC 65, 70-71 that in order to determine the meaning of words complained of it is necessary to take into account the context in which the words were used and the mode of publication," says Justice Tugendhat in his ruling.
"Thus a claimant cannot select an isolated passage in an article and complain of that alone if other parts of the article throw a different light on that passage.
"That principle has been established by a number of authorities all of which relate to printed publications. In a printed publication the text may be broken up and parts given more emphasis than others. Some parts may be on one page and a continuation of the same text may appear on a subsequent page," he said.
But Justice Tugendhat disagreed with the Spectator's claims that "the words complained of are incapable of being understood to refer to the Claimant", especially because of the "proper context" added by the "underlying hyperlinked documentation".
"I had little hesitation in reaching the conclusion that the words complained of were capable of referring to the Claimant [Islam Expo]," he said.
"The words 'IslamExpo' may well be the name both of the claimant corporation, and of the events which the claimant corporation organises from time to time. But the fact is that the words 'IslamExpo' appear in the relatively short words complained of."
While last week's hearing decided that the article in question referred to Islam Expo, a subsequent hearing will rule on whether the company was defamed by the remarks.
"Of course all that I have to decide, and all that I have decided, is that the words complained of are capable of referring to the Claimant. As to whether Mr Glen's submissions will be more successful (or not) at trial, when the question is what meaning the words complained of actually bear, nothing in this judgment is determinative of that," says the judge in his ruling.
