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Owner of Irish website The Liberal pays damages and issues apology for using court agency copy without paying
Max Mosley-funded press regulator Impress arbitrates £2.5k libel payout by website Byline which he has shares in
July 13, 2017
  • Media Law
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Byline Media ordered to pay journalist Dennis Rice £2,500 under first libel arbitration from regulator Impress

By Dominic Ponsford Twitter

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The arbitration arm of press regulator Impress has concluded its first complaint and ordered website Byline to pay £2,500 in libel damages to freelance journalist Dennis Rice.

Rice complained over two twitter messages posted by Byline, the journalism crowdfunding site which has signed up to Royal Charter-backed regulator Impress.

Timeline

  • March 22, 2019

    Byline team to rebrand and launch print title for subscribers in telling stories others 'have ignored'

  • September 13, 2018

    Impress dismisses complaint by child sex abuse victim named without consent in Byline article

  • June 12, 2018

    Byline Media and journalist Peter Jukes pursue damages and apology after hacking allegations by Brexit campaigners

Under the Royal Charter, Impress must offer claimants a free libel complaints arbitration scheme.

Rice opted to go to arbitration rather than have his case decided by the Impress complaints committee.

Rice complained over two Twitter messages posted from the Byline Media account on 6 March 2017.

He is a former investigations editor of the Mail on Sunday who today works as a freelance TV producer and PR consultant.

Byline sent the tweets in question as part of its investigation into the use of private detective Steve Whittamore by the Daily Mail and other titles and into the illegal “blagging” of private information in the mid 2000s.

Rice says that collectively the tweets in question were viewed by potentially over 54,000 people.

The first from the @Byline account said: “High on #blaggingscandal PI Steve Whittamore’s top contact list – AFTER charging – is @Dennisricemedia’s phone number and email”.

The second @Byline Twitter message said: “If anyone else remembers @Dennisricemedia tabloid trolling #Leveson witnesses and @Byline Media journos we have new evidence might explain”.

Rice told the arbitrator: “When the tweets – posted three minutes apart – are paired against me anyone reading them is left with the clear and false impression that I trolled witnesses to the Leveson inquiry in order to cover up the fact that I was a ‘top contact of Whittamore’.”

The panel found that tweet number one “lacked defamatory tendency”.

It said the panel’s view was that the meaning of the first tweet was that Rice was a “top contact” of Whittamore rather than that he had been engaged in blagging himself.

On tweet two the panel found that “tabloid trolling” means it was alleged Rice was involved in “disruptive and upsetting” activity.

Rice said the tweets caused him “serious harm” as required under the Defamation Act, because they come up in Google searches and could deter prospective clients for his business. The panel agreed that tweet number two was not true and did cause serious harm to Rice’s reputation.

It found that £2,500 was reasonable compensation for Rice and directed that Byline Media shall not republish the information.

Rice told Press Gazette: “I would like to thank the arbitrator and Impress for the professional way in which they dealt with my complaint.

“I now hope this brings to an end what has been a long and sorry conflict between myself and by Byline chief executive Peter Jukes.”

Byline said in a statement: “We are happy that this first arbitration process has defended us against Mr Rice’s claims for harassment and malicious falsehood and vindicated Byline Investigations by finding its first tweet accurate.”

On the tweet which was found to be defamatory, Byline said: “We are currently seeking legal advice on appealing this part of the decision to further establish the benchmarks for publishers. We will be launching our crowdfund for this very soon.””

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13 thoughts on “Byline Media ordered to pay journalist Dennis Rice £2,500 under first libel arbitration from regulator Impress”

  1. Liquidweb Coupon Codes says:
    March 29, 2019 at 11:56 am

    This is such an amazing blog post. I have you bookmarked to check out new stuff of your blog.. while reading I have feel that this blog is really have all those quality that qualify a blog to be a amazing. I must say keep up posting such more interesting blogs.

    Reply
  2. Dennis Rice says:
    November 20, 2017 at 12:40 am

    I get that you are not a journalist because we get proper training in law. But what I don’t get is your completely stupidity elsewhere. The nutter (who is suspect is you) claimed he had two separate pieces of evidence trapping my DNA from two different Twitter accounts. Yet he gave the police a single sheet of paper which was undated/untimed with one line of IP address on it which could have belonged to anyone. It was beyond ridiculous. It’s precisely why he wouldn’t produce it when asked out publicly before and why people you should never taken on real journalists like me. Now stop your crying and whining lol.

    Reply
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Max Mosley-funded press regulator Impress arbitrates £2.5k libel payout by website Byline which he has shares in

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