Judges order Tommy Robinson to pay Jamal Hijazi 100,000 kilos ($138,000) after ruling he libelled the Syrian schoolboy.
Judges ordered British far-right figurehead Tommy Robinson to pay 100,000 kilos ($138,000) to a Syrian schoolboy after ruling on Thursday that he had libelled the kid.
Jamal Hijazi, 18, was attacked within the playground at Almondbury Group Faculty in Huddersfield, northern England, in October 2018.
Shortly after the video of the incident went viral, Robinson, whose actual title is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, claimed in two Fb movies that Hijazi was himself a perpetrator of violence who “assaults younger English ladies in his faculty”.
Within the clips, seen by practically one million folks, 38-year-old Robinson additionally claimed Hijazi “beat a woman black and blue” and “threatened to stab” one other boy at his faculty. The allegations have been rejected by the court docket on Thursday.
Robinson, who represented himself, maintained his feedback have been broadly true, saying he had “uncovered dozens of accounts of aggressive, abusive and deceitful behaviour” by Hijazi.
However Excessive Court docket choose Matthew Nicklin stated Robinson had didn’t show his allegations and dominated in Hijazi’s favour, granting him 100,000 kilos ($137,000) in damages, in addition to ordering Robinson to pay prices which the PA information company understands to be greater than 500,000 kilos ($689,000).
Critical affect
Catrin Evans, Hijazi’s lawyer, stated the feedback led to her shopper receiving dying threats.
Nicklin stated, “The defendant took on the burden of proving his allegations to be true. He has failed. In actuality, and for the explanations I’ve defined, his proof fell woefully quick. He has, nonetheless, endured with the intense allegations he initially made, and has even added to them throughout the proceedings.”
“The claimant has needed to face them within the full glare and publicity of a Excessive Court docket trial. It’s my accountability to clarify that the defendant has failed in his defence of fact, to vindicate the claimant and to award him a sum in damages that represents truthful compensation.”
One other member of Hijazi’s authorized workforce welcomed the choice as a vindication.
“It took nice braveness for our shopper, Jamal Hijazi, to pursue his libel motion in opposition to such a distinguished far-right and anti-Islam activist as Stephen Yaxley-Lennon,” stated Francesca Flood.
“Jamal and his household now want to put this matter behind them so that they’ll get on with their lives. They do, nonetheless, want to lengthen their gratitude to the nice British public for his or her assist and generosity, with out which this authorized motion wouldn’t have been doable,” she added.
Nicklin stated Hijazi suffered “significantly extreme” penalties from the movies.
“The defendant’s allegations in opposition to the claimant have been very severe and have been printed extensively,” he stated.