AAL Insight: Hopkins, Monroe, and the future of Libel

Feb 10, 2018

Written By Jack J Collins, Editor of AllAboutLaw.co.uk

This week, Katie Hopkins was ordered to pay more than £24,000 in damage costs to blogger and columnist Jack Monroe after a row on Twitter escalated in a major way.

The case was centred on a series of tweets exchanged in May 2015, where Hopkins confused Monroe with political commentator Laurie Penny, who writes for the New Statesman (Monroe writes for the Guardian.)

Penny had tweeted regarding the vandalism of the memorial to the women who served in the Second World War, which had been inscribed with the words “F**k Tory Scum” during an anti-austerity demonstration.

Making a comment about this, Penny stated that she felt there wasn’t a problem with vandalism as a form of protest, because “the bravery of past generations does not oblige us to be cowed today”.

In response to this, and clearly confused as to whom the original opinion had come from, Hopkins launched a scathing attack on Monroe, tweeting: “Scrawled on any memorials recently? Vandalised the memory of those who fought for your freedom. Grandma got any more medals?”

Considering Monroe is from an armed forces family, the chances were always that this wasn’t going to go down well, and Monroe responded in a furious manner, tweeting back at Hopkins: “I have NEVER ‘scrawled on a memorial’. Brother in the RAF. Dad was a Para in the Falklands. You’re a piece of sh*t.”

She followed this up with a second message which asked for Hopkins to apologise and to eat a slice of humble pie, after her stance on the migrant issue which had become common fanfare over the latter end of 2016.

Monroe tweeted: “Dear @KTHopkins, public apology + £5K to migrant rescue and I won’t sue. It’ll be cheaper for you and v satisfying for me.” Whilst Hopkins deleted her original tweet, no apology was forthcoming. Instead, the notorious agitator did perhaps what she does best, and exacerbated the situation.

Instead of an apology, Hopkins decided to fuel the fire. “Can someone explain to me – in 10 words or less – the difference between irritant @PennyRed and social anthrax @MsJackMonroe”, she tweeted shortly after Monroe’s request.

Monroe made good on her original threat, and began libel action against Hopkins on February 27 of this year. In her opening speech to the court, Monroe told the judge and jury that the tweets from Hopkins has led to hate messages that had ultimately escalated to death threats.

Monroe’s lawyers had argued that Hopkins tweets, even when the original message was deleted, suggested that Monroe condoned the vandalism of the memorial, or of any war memorial, or had actually committed such desecration herself, which was not only a criminal act, but also an insult to the memory of her own family and the wider community that had fought for freedom.

William Bennett, who was speaking on Monroe’s behalf, told the court that the tweet was “a particular affront” because of Monroe’s position “as a member of a family closely involved with the armed forces”.

Hopkins’ second tweet, naming Monroe as ‘social anthrax’ and aligning her with the views of Penny on this particular matter, was named by Monroe’s lawyers as carrying a “defamatory innuendo meaning”

And Bennett went on to indulge the court further, claiming that Monroe’s point of issue was that by “reason of the seriousness of the allegations and the scale of publication, serious harm to reputation has been caused.

“A widely published allegation that someone has either vandalised a war memorial or approved of such an act will inevitably cause serious damage to reputation.”

In response, Hopkins’ lawyers, led by Jonathan Price, argued that the matter was a “relatively trivial dispute” that had arisen on Twitter and that had been “resolved on Twitter in a period of several hours.”

He went on to suggest that “no lasting harm, and certainly no serious harm”, to the reputation of Monroe had been caused. Price said his client’s position was that “these proceedings are an unnecessary and disproportionate epilogue to the parties’ otherwise forgotten Twitter row”.

Monroe’s lawyer, Mark Lewis, said after the judgement had been passed in favour of his client, that Hopkins had stubbornly refused to simply apologise throughout the entire saga, and that the way she had tried to cover up her mistake and obstinacy had been just “slinging as much mud as possible” at Monroe.

“The price of not saying sorry has been very high. Hopkins has had to pay out of her own pocket a six-figure sum in damages and costs for a tweet that should have been deleted within minutes as soon as she was told it was wrong.”

As one might imagine, the result became a rapidly trending Twitter topic. Monroe tweeted to her supporters, stating: “I’ll be writing a longer statement shortly, but for now, to everyone who told me I couldn’t, wouldn’t, shouldn’t – I could, I would, I did.”

Mark Stephens, a partner at Howard Kennedy, commented further on the result of the case to The Times’ ‘The Brief’ column, whereupon he noted that a host of recent online defamation cases have ended in payouts or settlements of around £4,000.

“It is interesting that the judge has set the tariff in this case much higher,” said Stephens. “Twitter is now the saviour of the libel work for English lawyers.”

There was something further in that many lawyers see the Monroe v Hopkins ruling as making the online press as now on a level par with the traditional print press. “Today you don't need access to a printing press, typewriter or computer; a phone will suffice to make you a publisher,” said Amber Melville-Brown, a partner at Withers.

“Your words can cause substantial damage and distress – and can leave you paying substantial damages as a result. Free speech means the ability to free-tweet if you like, but don’t think there won’t be a price to pay if you break the law when you do so.”

Commercial Insights