Two survivors of the Manchester Arena bombing have won a High Court harassment case against a former television producer who claimed the attack was staged.
Martin Hibbert and his daughter Eve sued Richard Hall for harassment and data protection in what was the first such case launched against a conspiracy theorist in the UK.
Mr Hibbert was left with a spinal cord injury and Ms Hibbert suffered severe brain damage as a result of the attack at the venue on 22 May 2017.
Mr Hall had told the court his actions, which included filming Eve outside her home, were in the public interest as a journalist and claimed “millions of people” had “bought a lie” about the attack.
Twenty-two people were killed and hundreds more injured when Salman Abedi detonated a homemade rucksack-bomb in the foyer of the venue as thousands of people left an Ariana Grande concert.
The court was told the Hibberts were among those standing nearest to the bomber at the time of the blast.
Across several videos and a book, Mr Hall claimed several of those who died were living abroad or were dead before the attack and told the court he believed that no-one was “genuinely injured” in the bombing.
Twenty two people died and at least 59 were injured in the attack in 2017 (Image: Reuters)
In a 63-page judgement, Mrs Justice Steyn said the Hibberts had won their harassment claim, but said she would not decide the data protection claim at this stage.
The judge said she found Hall to be “unreflective and insensitive to the level of distress likely to be caused by his persistent attempts to discredit what those who have suffered so tragically in the Attack say about it”.
He “abused media freedom” to publish false allegations based on the “flimsiest of analytical techniques, and dismissing the obvious, tragic reality to which so many ordinary people have attested”.
Mr Hibbert said the ruling was a “comprehensive victory” which he hoped would help “protect others from what we have been put through in the future”.
He said he planned to talk to his legal team following the ruling with the aim of “establishing a new law in Eve’s name”.
“I don’t want to make much more comment until the final terms of the judgment are agreed in terms of settlements, and hopefully an injunction being imposed.”
The judge said there was “powerful evidence that Mr Hall’s course of conduct caused Mr Hibbert to suffer alarm, distress and anxiety”.
Jonathan Price, representing the Hibberts, said the bomb had changed his clients’ lives “in every conceivable way”.
“They have both suffered life-changing injuries from which they will never recover,” the barrister said.
The court heard that Mr Hibbert received 22 wounds from shrapnel, while his daughter suffered a “catastrophic brain injury” and was initially presumed dead at the scene after a bolt from the bomb struck her in the head.
“Martin, paralysed, saw Eve lying next to him with a hole in her head and assumed he was watching her die, unable to help,” he said.
“He saw others lying dead or injured around him.”
‘Powerful evidence’
Kerry Gillespie, a solicitor for the Hibberts, the case was “hugely important in the wider context of sending a very clear message to people who think they have the right to publish absurd, harmful, unfounded allegations against others.”
“This is often happening against people who have already suffered from high-profile tragedies in their lives”, she said
“Sadly, we live in a world where this repugnant behaviour is becoming all the more common, where people like Mr Hall have access to many media platforms which enable them to publish their abhorrent, unfounded opinions and allegations.
“Many feel they can do this unchallenged, hiding behind the facade of challenging the official narrative.”
She said the Judge’s findings set a precedent which would pave the way for more people’s behaviour to be challenged and brought to the courts.
Analysis: A landmark case
It is the first time such action has been taken – and won – in the UK against a conspiracy theorist.
The ruling follows a BBC Panorama and Radio 4 podcast investigation in 2022, which revealed how the Hibberts were among victims targeted by Mr Hall.
Hall has described online how he tracked down survivors to their homes and workplaces in what he said was to see if they were lying about their injuries.
He admitted to the BBC that he spied on Eve Hibbert from a vehicle parked outside her home.
He also described his tactics in a book he sells and promoted theories online that several other UK terror attacks were staged.
During the original investigation he insisted the BBC was wrong about how he operates.
This civil case sets a huge precedent for terror attack survivors and people more generally targeted by conspiracy theories here in the UK, including accusations they are paid actors or what they lived through was staged.
It is a blueprint for holding the people who spread these ideas on social media to account, with those targeted describing how they have often felt there was no way of stopping this happening.
Source: bbc.co.uk
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