A woman from Queensland has been awarded $10,000 after suing her ex-husband for a defamatory Facebook post he made in 2014.
June Marion Kelly initially sought $150,000 from ex David Levick who it seems was pretty pissed off about the divorce, writing on Facebook:
“June turned out to be a thieving, lying, money crazed bitch who screwed me out of nearly 3 million rand – may she rot in Hell”
Levick tried to argue that he wasn’t liable for the post because he had initially meant to make it private, and also that it couldn’t be certain whose jurisdiction it was, as he had done the post in South Africa and there was no way to tell where it was “downloaded”.
The judge dismissed the first claim on the grounds that defamation just requires that the information is communicated to a third person and dismissed the second claim on the grounds that it was ridiculous.
Levick also tried to deny that the post was about his ex-wife, who was mentioned by name in the post, which didn’t stick.
The judge settled on $10,000 as an accurate reflection of the damage caused.
Source: SMH.
