Reputation is everything and where yours is at risk of being irreparably damaged you need to act quickly to stop this happening. Whether you are the subject of spurious allegations or unfounded malicious gossip these are steps you can take to prevent untruths about you or your business being repeated and to ensure you receive compensation for any harm caused.
These steps include applying for a injunction to bring an immediate stop to the publication of stories about you that are untrue, together with the issuing of defamation proceedings to claim appropriate recompense.
What are defamation proceedings?
Defamation proceedings are a type of legal claim issued against the person you accuse of defaming you, either by printing untruths (which is libel) or speaking untruths (which is slander). To succeed in this type of claim you need to prove that:
- what has been said or printed is untrue and is likely to lower public opinion of you;
- it is obvious that the statement that has been made references you or your business and even where you are not specifically named it would be possible to identify you from what has been said or written; and
- the offending statement has been communicated to at least one other person.
In slander cases only, you will also usually need to show that as a result of the statement has been made you have suffered some form of financial harm.
A claim for defamation must be commenced within a year of the offending statement being made and ideally much earlier to maximise the value of your claim.
In addition to defamation proceedings, or sometimes alongside them, you may also be able to bring a claim for malicious falsehood where you can shows that an untrue statement has been made against you or your business with the deliberate intention of damaging your interests or causing you economic harm.
How can IMD Solicitors help?
Our experienced dispute resolution lawyers can help you by:
- preventing the publication or broadcast of stories and pictures by media outlets obtained through a gross invasion of your privacy;
- forcing internet service providers to remove offending online posts;
- restraining commercial competitors from repeating untruths designed to damage your business interests; and
- blocking the publication of information obtained as result of a media sting.
Why choose IMD Solicitors?
Our experienced dispute resolution solicitors have dealt with a large number of defamation and malicious falsehood claims and are well versed in the steps that need to be taken to ensure untruths about you are not being repeated, that a public apology is made where required and that those responsible for making the offending statement are duly punished.
We have an impressive success rate in achieving out court settlements and and equally impressive record winning highly contested cases.With offices in London, Birmingham and Manchester we are ideally placed to attend hearings at any UK High Court hearing centre.
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List of notable dispute resolution cases
- Multi-jurisdictional dispute involving international consortium of corporate shareholders of a Saudi oil and gas subsidiary, involving allegations of fraud and breaches of contractual obligations. Liquidation of the subsidiary was sought by a proportion of shareholders. Settlement was reached between all and liquidation successfully prevented.
- Dual-jurisdictional dispute involving essentially a battle between conglomerate of companies, with proceedings lodged with various courts across two jurisdictions involving complex jurisdictional and commercial matters.
- Claim against international plc involving defending allegations of fraud. Concluded successfully and saved the Client from insolvency.
- Acting for a Claimant in a dispute with a global payment processing institution, involving misconduct allegations and challenge to jurisdiction. Case settled at over 80% of the amount claimed despite initial arguments and denial by the institution.
- Defended a breach of contract claim involving a cross-border supply of goods. Using strong defence arguments but preserving our client’s commercial position, we managed to resolve the matter through a reduction of the main claim by 75% and potential costs liability by 80%.
- Acted for a construction company in a claim to recover an unpaid contractual fees. Judgment in favour of the Client secured a trial despite little documentary evidence available and relying mostly on witness evidence.
- Represented a company Director in a successfully defended claim involving allegations of fraud and breach of fiduciary duties
- Acting for a claimant in a construction dispute. The matter proceeded to trial where the Claimant successfully obtained a judgement for the full amount.
- Acting for a defendant who failed to file a defence and had default judgement entered against him prior to instructing our firm. The judgement was set aside and eventually the value of the claim was reduced by 75%.
- Acting for a creditor in a reported High Court case relating to enforcement of a foreign judgement in the UK. Successfully defended an application by a debtor to declare the judgement unenforceable.
- Regularly acting for a group of companies dealing with medical equipment manufacturing and worldwide distribution. Assisting with both contentious and non-contentious cases ranging from commercial and employment to GDPR compliance.
- Represented a Client in a complex shareholders’ dispute concluded by the way of agreement and voluntary liquidation of the company.
- Acting for the UK based construction company in a dispute with a contractors. Settled the claim for circa. 90% of the amount originally claimed.
- Pursuing a claim against a firm of solicitors who have provided our client with negligent advice. Successful recovery of circa 80% of the loss incurred.
- Acting for a large meat supplier in a dispute with the distributor arising due to faulty product being introduced earlier in the supply chain.
- Successfully defending a client from committal to prison, in a private prosecution brought by the insurers of a third party following a road traffic collision.
- Acting in a dispute with the main contractor on a construction project. Successfully recovered our client’s losses incurred as a result of the main contractor and successfully defended all counterclaims that were brought against our client.
- Acting for an investor in a dispute with a trading company. Successfully obtained a judgment for the sums deducted from the client’s account by the trading company.
- Acting for a landlord in possession proceedings. Successfully obtained a court order for possession and evicted the tenant using the court appointed bailiff.
- Acting for a claimant in a Professional Negligence matter, successfully settling the case before trial
Awards and Accreditations
IMD in the Media
