From the ongoing saga of the high-profile Christian Porter action against the ABC to ābackyardā litigation testing the serious harm bar, defamation cases made headlines in 2022, with winners and losers alike shelling out millions to lawyers to protect their reputations.
A judge has found Nine should not face an out-of-time defamation action over an allegedly defamatory episode of A Current Affair that aired in 2019.
In one of the first cases to test a new ‘serious harm’ threshold for defamation matters, a judge has knocked back a NSW house painterās defamation case over a one star Google review, saying that people would consider āunflatteringā business reviews to be expressions of personal opinion.Ā
Nine Entertainment and Marcus Bastiaan have reached a settlement which includes a contribution to legal costs but no damages in a defamation case over a 60 Minutes segment accusing the former Liberal powerbroker of branch stacking.
A Corrs Chambers Westgarth veteran known for his work defending the Catholic Church has left the law firm for rival Wotton + Kearney, taking with him a number of senior associates as well as the Catholic Archdiocese of Melbourne.
Western Australian Liberal Senator Linda Reynolds has reportedly sued publisher HarperCollins and journalist Aaron Patrick for defamation over a book chapter which delved into Brittany Higgins’ rape allegations against former Liberal staffer Bruce Lehrmann.
Former president of the Melbourne Football Club and Clayton Utz veteran Glen Bartlett has lost a bid to keep his defamation case against four MFC board members in Western Australia, with a judge finding the ārelevant characters overwhelmingly continue to live in Melbourne.ā
The man behind the Twitter handle Stock Swami has been ordered to pay $275,000 in damages to Tolga Kumova, after a judge found his tweets defamed the mining investor by accusing him of insider trading, misleading the market, and running a pump and dump scheme.
Lawyers for respondents in defamation litigation have been put on notice for their practice of tossing defences around like grenades in armed combat — it isn’t going to fly any more, warns a judge whose docket is stacked with high profile cases.
The state of Western Australia has been left with a $2 million legal bill for defending a defamation actionĀ by billionaire Clive Palmer and advancing cross-claims on behalf of premier Mark McGowan, which a judge blasted as “a futile exercise”.