News & Publications
The Media, Justification and Contextual Truth: Insights from the Ben Roberts-Smith Defamation Trial
Roberts-Smith v Fairfax Media Publications Pty Limited (No 41) [2023] FCA 555 The Ben Roberts-Smith and Fairfax defamation proceedings have been some of the most widely reported, controversial, and expensive in Australian legal history. Aside from the matter’s unique...
Harman Undertakings: The restrictions on using documents provided under compulsion in litigation
Where a party to litigation is compelled to hand over documents in the case, those documents can only be used by the recipient for the purpose of the litigation in which the documents were obtained. This undertaking not to use documents obtained under compulsion for...
Google LLC v Defteros [2022] HCA 27
On 17 August 2022, the High Court, by majority, found that Google was not a publisher of a defamatory media report which appeared on a user conducting an enquiry on Google’s search engine after inputting certain key search terms. In proceedings originally commenced by...
SSL’s Jasmine Sims scores a win for open justice
Pleasing to see open justice prevailing once again over an application by an accused for media coverage suppression, and ditto the success of our SSL media law specialist Jasmine Sims making it so for West Australian Newspapers before Chief Magistrate Heath last week....
Defamation exposure – posts by others on your social media page, The High Court speaks – the Voller litigation
The High Court in a recent 5-2 majority judgment dismissed appeals brought by three media organisations, a decision which upheld the findings of the Court of Appeal of New South Wales that the media companies were primary publishers of allegedly defamatory content uploaded by third-party Facebook users to their online news platforms.
Nick Stagg appointed to national defamation law working group
Steedman Stagg Lawyers is pleased to announce Nick Stagg’s appointment to the Law Council of Australia’s Defamation Working Group. The Working Group will advise the Law Council on defamation law and assist the Law Council in responding to the current Review of Model...