Baby Reindeer (Netflix)

[kabbes]

Quite a bit more in the Lozza Fox case...

Still in the tens of thousands (£90,000 each) and emotional damage was just one of the three prongs that the judge argued as having relevance to the total, which were:

(a) compensation for the substantial victimisation and natural consequent distress wrongfully inflicted upon them by Mr Fox’s libels; (b) recompense for the general reputational jeopardy and harm actually sustained as a result of those libels, including as evidenced in the abuse they have received; and (c) a completion of the vindication process sufficient to convince a fair-minded bystander of the utter baselessness of these libels and enable and entitle the Claimants, as free citizens, to put this unpleasant incident and its consequences behind them.

The judgement is here and is actually quite an interesting read to see how these things are put together: https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Blake-v-Fox-Remedies-Judgment.pdf. It’s particularly worth reading paragraphs 4-10, which lays out the basis on which values are placed on the damage. I won’t reproduce it all, because you can just click through, but paragraph 9 is worth pulling out:

Broadly, the purpose of an award of damages in defamation proceedings is to compensate for injury to reputation and to feelings, and in particular to vindicate claimants, so far as money can to do that. Vindication and compensation are not to be thought of in compartmentalised terms: the overall purpose of the award remains to restore a claimant, to the extent money can do so, to the position as if the libel had not occurred. But in defamation cases that means not only redressing the balance in terms of quantifiable losses, but unequivocally albeit proportionately restoring a claimant’s standing to its previous state. (In the present case, I have already described the Claimants’ previous standing as ‘pristine’.) As the authorities put it, the sum awarded must be an outward and visible sign of vindication, sending a message restoring a claimant’s good name ‘sufficient to convince a bystander of the baselessness of the charge’. If an award fails to achieve vindication, it fails properly to compensate and restore the status quo ante.

Let’s not forget that Fox accused two men that worked with children, of previously “pristine standing”, of being paedophiles. The judge needed to make a judgement big enough to recompense for their reputational harm in a way that would undo the damage of this specific claim for these specific individuals — parts (b) and (c) in the first paragraph. As she says, you have to award an amount big enough that people sit up and take notice, so bystanders afterwards are left in no doubt that these two still have pristine standing, Even including that, and even with all the exacerbating factors for emotional distress that the judge goes through, the total only came to £90,000. So you can draw your own conclusions that emotional distress alone is not enough for a particularly material award, without all these other factors. Like I said, a handful of tens of thousands in the most extreme cases and low thousands otherwise. And there many cases out there where the judge has awarded £1 — defamation is technically accurate, but there is essentially no harm done by it.

So then we look at Martha’s case. Definitely not of “pristine standing”. A judge would have to think about the extent that she has been harmed by implications in the programme that are not true about her, when there are also things (including things not put into the programme) that are true. She’d only get a small fraction of the £90,000 that the Fox victims got. Frankly, she’s much more likely to be one of the £1 cases if she can prove defamation at all.

 

[ouirdeaux]

'Pristine standing' sounds like an extremely uncomfortable form of exercise.

 

[Agent Sparrow]

'Pristine standing' sounds like an extremely uncomfortable form of exercise.

Reminds me of rape cases where such effort is put into showing the survivors as not being “pristine”.

 

[belboid]

Still in the tens of thousands (£90,000 each) and emotional damage was just one of the three prongs that the judge argued as having relevance to the total, which were:



The judgement is here and is actually quite an interesting read to see how these things are put together: https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Blake-v-Fox-Remedies-Judgment.pdf. It’s particularly worth reading paragraphs 4-10, which lays out the basis on which values are placed on the damage. I won’t reproduce it all, because you can just click through, but paragraph 9 is worth pulling out:



Let’s not forget that Fox accused two men that worked with children, of previously “pristine standing”, of being paedophiles. The judge needed to make a judgement big enough to recompense for their reputational harm in a way that would undo the damage of this specific claim for these specific individuals — parts (b) and (c) in the first paragraph. As she says, you have to award an amount big enough that people sit up and take notice, so bystanders afterwards are left in no doubt that these two still have pristine standing, Even including that, and even with all the exacerbating factors for emotional distress that the judge goes through, the total only came to £90,000. So you can draw your own conclusions that emotional distress alone is not enough for a particularly material award, without all these other factors. Like I said, a handful of tens of thousands in the most extreme cases and low thousands otherwise. And there many cases out there where the judge has awarded £1 — defamation is technically accurate, but there is essentially no harm done by it.

So then we look at Martha’s case. Definitely not of “pristine standing”. A judge would have to think about the extent that she has been harmed by implications in the programme that are not true about her, when there are also things (including things not put into the programme) that are true. She’d only get a small fraction of the £90,000 that the Fox victims got. Frankly, she’s much more likely to be one of the £1 cases if she can prove defamation at all.

You could have saved a lot of typing by just going ‘okay, I was talking crap about the financial damages thing’

 

[Petcha]

How hard can it be to check if someone's been convicted of a crime? Jesus, £133m. She could settle for half that and still be quite pleased.

Baby Reindeer in court: the two words that might have saved Netflix $170m worth of grief

As Fiona Harvey sues the streaming giant over its hit show, what does it mean for TV? Brace for plenty of fudging of the facts and a lot more carefully worded disclaimers

www.theguardian.com

 

[Petcha]

I've only just finished watching it. It smacks of bullshit. Although Morgan said he's interviewed many liars, sociopaths etc and she was clearly in that category, but he didn't fully buy Gadd's side of the story.

If she was never convicted, and Netflix says it's a 'true story', then Netflix are fucked. I assume her lawyers have done due diligence on that.

 

[two sheds]

Haven't followed this, but did she come forward and say it was her, or confirm it was her?

 

[scifisam]

Haven't followed this, but did she come forward and say it was her, or confirm it was her?

Yes. And I guess the "true story" thing is because they really did not try to disguise her ID other than changing her name.

She's suing in the US so that changes things - no idea if it makes her claim less or more likely to succeed, but the kite-flying sum makes it seem like it might fail.

 

[Petcha]

Haven't followed this, but did she come forward and say it was her, or confirm it was her?

She was identified by 'internet sleuths'. 'Based on' could be the two most expensive words in TV history. She's clearly nuts but then I think it's really fucking weird he played himself as well. And had a stage play about it night after night. Surely it's the kind of experience you want to block out not relive again and again, voluntarily.

 

[Petcha]

The alleged rapist has also been tracked down by internet sleuths but is yet to cash in with interviews denying it all

 

[Silas Loom]

This again . . .

She was identified by 'internet sleuths'. 'Based on' could be the two most expensive words in TV history. She's clearly nuts but then I think it's really fucking weird he played himself as well. And had a stage play about it night after night. Surely it's the kind of experience you want to block out not relive again and again, voluntarily.

The alleged rapist has also been tracked down by internet sleuths but is yet to cash in with interviews denying it all

Another reason to hate newspapers and everyone who writes for them: the convention of referring to people with mild curiosity and the ability to use a search engine contemptuously as “Internet sleuths” or “obsessive fans”.

Why do they do it? Simply because journalistic practice is to give away as many juicy details as is possible without actually identifying individuals, and they need to pretend that jigsaw identification is only possible when unusual people go to absurd lengths.

 

[Epona]

Surely it's the kind of experience you want to block out not relive again and again, voluntarily.

Not going to go into the whole legality of the claims made or anything, but this is just vile really - it's not up to you to judge people who may have experienced stalking or sexual abuse based on how you think they ought to behave or deal with it.

 

[Epona]

In fact I'll go further than that - expecting people who have experienced stalking, harassment or sexual abuse to put up and shut up and quietly internalise it and feel guilty and unable to talk about it is part of the problem.

 

[danny la rouge]

Not going to go into the whole legality of the claims made or anything, but this is just vile really - it's not up to you to judge people who may have experienced stalking or sexual abuse based on how you think they ought to behave or deal with it.

I tried to watch the series, but couldn’t get beyond episode one. It felt too unsettling.

But whatever the truth or otherwise of the story, I agree with Epona - it’s not up to anyone else to tell survivors how to process their experiences.

 

[Petcha]

it just seems fucking bizarre to me that he was reliving it every night on stage and then pitched it to Netflix, made millions out of it and then it turns out the crux of it is untrue. She wouldn't have a massive law firm sueing a massive streaming company if the basic premise of this is that she was found guilty and locked up was true.

 

[Petcha]

anyway, the net result of the inevitable settlement here, given that a large portion of it is 'dubious' is that as that Guardian says is that we're all gonna have to sit through far more detailed disclaimers in future

 

[Epona]

Or maybe, you know, just going out on a limb here - sometimes people who have experienced such things are telling the truth, and there are lawyers wanting to make money from their fees for taking a up a defamation claim.

 

[Petcha]

It says at the end of the series she was locked up. At the beginning of the series it says 'this is a true story'.

If she wasn't locked up, which presumably she wasnt if its got this far then I'd say that's a pretty clear cut case of defamation.

 

[Chz]

£133M is the "come and make a deal with us" figure. Netflix has priors here, though not quite as extreme, and they've always been happy to settle out of court for an amount that still leaves them happily profiting from the whole affair.

 

[Petcha]

£133M is the "come and make a deal with us" figure. Netflix has priors here, though not quite as extreme, and they've always been happy to settle out of court for an amount that still leaves them happily profiting from the whole affair.

Did nobody at Netflix think to check the veracity of everything? The guy himself comes across as very unhinged himself.

 

[Epona]

Which is it?
Did Netflix fail to do enough to protect the identities of the alleged perpetrators involved?
Or should they have been completely truthful and stuck to 100% fact without changing anything?

I mean in theory I have no particular issue with any big money-grabbing corporation having to stump up a large wadge of cash, but I'm fairly certain this is to get an out of court settlement.

I ought to add that even if some of it was made up, if this woman was harassing him, then I have absolutely zero sympathy for her, her supposed good name, or her sensibilities - having been stalked and harassed myself in the past.

 

[Poot]

Which is it?
Did Netflix fail to do enough to protect the identities of the alleged perpetrators involved?
Or should they have been completely truthful and stuck to 100% fact without changing anything?

I mean in theory I have no particular issue with any big money-grabbing corporation having to stump up a large wadge of cash, but I'm fairly certain this is to get an out of court settlement.

I ought to add that even if some of it was made up, if this woman was harassing him, then I have absolutely zero sympathy for her, her supposed good name, or her sensibilities - having been stalked and harassed myself in the past.

Innit. This was always going to be a possibility. It must be so, so, so tempting if you're being stalked and harrassed and you're a writer to do exactly what he did. "Look! Look what I am up against!" I have complete sympathy for his position. If only someone at Netflix had thought it through, and had a word about it mabe being "based on" a true story or 100% accurate, he'd still be in the pound seats and rightly so. I feel like he's been let down. Again.

 

[shakespearegirl]

Did nobody at Netflix think to check the veracity of everything? The guy himself comes across as very unhinged himself.

A major part of à producer’s job is ensuring that everything has been verified. I worked on a documentary recently and we couldn’t deliver our final edit until it had gone via the errors and omissions issuers. We hadn’t changed any of the actual content, just the order but it still had to be recleared.

I’ve delivered content into Netflix before and I’d describe them as incredibly hot on compliance.

 

[Petcha]

Innit. This was always going to be a possibility. It must be so, so, so tempting if you're being stalked and harrassed and you're a writer to do exactly what he did. "Look! Look what I am up against!" I have complete sympathy for his position. If only someone at Netflix had thought it through, and had a word about it mabe being "based on" a true story or 100% accurate, he'd still be in the pound seats and rightly so. I feel like he's been let down. Again.

How has he been let down if he was the one who made up key areas of his story? Yes Netflix should have checked it but hes the one who told the story to them in the first place.

 

[Petcha]

So it's been confirmed that she never had a criminal record. Before or after meeting Gadd. They claimed throughout the series that she had been done for stalking in the past and then ended with her being banged up.

Oops Netflix.