The ability of those out there on the far right to become embroiled in libel cases, after they gratuitously defame followers of The Prophet and anyone associated with them, is already well known. UKIP MEP Jane Collins landed herself and her party with the six-figure legal bill after claiming that three Labour MPs knew about the Rotherham grooming scandal, but did nothing about it. Then came pro-am motormouth Katie Hopkins.
I em not a racialist but, und zis is a big but ...
Hatey Katie dumped an eye-watering costs and damages bill on to Mail Online after claiming that a group of Muslims who had been refused entry to the USA were terrorists. Now it is the Kippers’ turn, once more, to be in the spotlight after their former Bristol chairmen was ordered yesterday to pay £40,000 - plus costs, which will be in the hundreds of thousands - to a Muslim man who was libelled on the basis of no evidence at all.
As Bristol Live has reported, “Zahir Monir, 39, of Rotherham, South Yorkshire, brought libel proceedings at London's High Court against Steve Wood, who was also the UKIP candidate for Bristol South at the May 2015 general election … Mr Monir sued over a Tweet posted on the Bristol UKIP Twitter account - three days before the General Election on May 4, 2015 … The tweet was written and posted by John Langley - the branch's vice-chairman at the time”. And there was more.
Someone should consider themselves lucky for not being part of that libel case, after amplifying the offending Tweet
“It featured a photo of Mr Monir and another individual standing either side of Labour MP Sarah Champion, with the statement: ‘Sarah Champion labour candidate for Rotherham stood with 2 suspended child grooming taxi drivers DO NOT VOTE LABOUR’”. But it was the eventual reach of the Tweet that made the libel worse.
“It was published to @BristolUKIP's 547 followers, re-tweeted at least 17 times, liked at least eight times, published on the official Bristol UKIP webpage and republished on Facebook … One of those who shared it was English Defence League founder and convicted fraudster Tommy Robinson, whose Twitter account at the time had 138,000 followers”. One wonders if Stephen Yaxley Lennon called it “THE TRUTH”.
Monir’s “property had been egged and a brick thrown through a window, while he had been called ‘Jimmy Savile’ by another parent at the school where he was previously a parent governor”. This was exacerbated by Monir “forced to fight a libel claim all the way through to trial with every single conceivable point being taken against him”. Like Jane Collins, like Katie Hopkins, there was not even a sign of retraction.
Indeed, “The judge said Mr Wood, a former police officer who now runs a bailiff firm, had adopted a ‘mean-spirited stance’ by refusing to publicly apologise and withdraw the allegation … He added: ‘He has become completely convinced that he has done nothing wrong and therefore he will not apologise for or retract the allegation … On a simply human level, this is a difficult stance to understand.’” But not if you know UKIP.
They, and the rest of those out there on the far right, are convinced that every one of those Scary Muslims™ is A Very Bad Person. So the occasional libel should, in their minds, be permitted them. It’s only Muslims. Like it was only Jews in the Third Reich, or only Blacks in Apartheid-era South Africa. The Kippers truly believe in “othering”.
There’s been no comment from Tommy Robinson or Katie Hopkins. I wonder why.
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