Remember when I wrote about a student who pretended to know the law at an expert level when she didn’t? This person sadly has not learnt any lessons. The crux of the matter is as follows:
The student made large claims that she was ‘a solicitor with 25 years practicing experience’. This has been continually affirmed in writing, that is, the student continues to make this claim even though there is no evidence of this… in fact, the evidence points to the opposite, a rather low understanding of the law, and basic English Language.
A polite request wondering why the student wanted an(other) LLB when that student was already a practicing lawyer returned the response that ‘the student wanted to become a judge’. Basic Google searches reveal that a ‘second’ LLB is not a requirement to be a judge.
You may be wondering why I brought this up again… well, the matter is now in the public domain as the student filed a claim for defamation in the County Court where it was dismissed because (a) it was the wrong court, and (b) the case had ‘no prospect of success’.
Not to be deterred, the valiant warrior for the underdog again took up cudgels and, armed with a mighty misunderstanding of law on the whole, and defamation law (and the Civil Procedure Rules (CPR)) in particular, strode boldly into the High Court to seek and do justice. The fight was short and not especially vicious, and didn’t even raise a sweat on the defendants’ brows as the referee (judge) took one look at the wandering of the wayward warrior’s mind and ruled “particulars of claim and accompanying documents are an abuse of the court's process or is otherwise likely to obstruct the just disposal of proceedings”.
The gist of the circumstances at the High Court is this – the claim was initially stayed to give the claimant (our student and intrepid warrior) opportunity to rewrite it because the original claim was some 10 pages of incoherent rambling and which was not in compliance with the CPR (16 and 53). The revised claim was 79 pages (nearly 270 paragraphs) of even more incoherence which led the judge to ask if the claimant even knew the meaning of the word ‘concise’. The claim was then dismissed in its entirety because ‘it had no real chance of success’ as the claimant appeared to have no understanding of law or of how civil litigation works.
Nevertheless, our intrepid warrior refuses to stay down. A request to appeal has been made, itself having no ‘real prospect of success’ but further reiterating how this person lives in a world created entirely within her own mind.
Sadly, among the evidence submitted to the court was a medical letter which affirms that this student has mental health problems. What is even sadder is that even such a person is allowed to make mistakes in making decisions, because under the Mental Capacity Act 2005, a person is deemed to have capacity unless “it is established that he lacks capacity” and “a person is not to be treated as unable to make a decision merely because he makes an unwise decision”.
Her mistakes in this case has caused her over £8,000 so far in awards against her for defendants’ legal expenses.
As I said before, pretending to know the law is not advised, especially among people who actually know the law.
Having had some personal involvement with this saga, I can perhaps shed more light on what a complete dog's breakfast this has been.
ReplyDeleteAny allegation of defamation now falls under the Defamation Act 2013, and claims under this heading can only be brought in the High Court, not the County Court. The Act, in Section 1, states that "A statement is not defamatory unless its publication has caused or is likely to cause serious harm to the reputation of the claimant."
So what is meant by serious harm? The Master of the High Court, when dismissing the Student's application to lift the stay of proceedings, gave an example. He said that if something derogatory and untrue was published in a newspaper about a schoolteacher, and as a result that teacher was suspended from the school, and was subsequently unable to find another teaching job, he would clearly have a claim for the reputational damage caused.
The question for the intrepid Student, therefore, is did she suffer reputational damage? When introducing herself to the Forum (a closed resource only accessible by Open University law students and staff), she claimed to be a practising solicitor with 25 years' experience; she claimed to have graduated with a previous LLB degree in 2002; and she claimed to have represented a party in an Employment Tribunal case.
All of these assertions were patently ridiculous and untrue, and she was called out on them by various other students. As her postings become more and more pompous and self-righteous, so the responses of fellow students become more acerbic and satirical. Her reputation, as far as the Forum was concerned, was that of a fraudulent fake. She did not, therefore, have a reputation which was capable of being damaged - she did that all by herself.
A recent defamation case decided by the High Court, was that of Sube & Sube v News Group Newspapers & Express Newspapers [2018] EWHC 1234 (QB). (Full judgment here: https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/sube-v-news-group-ltd-2018-ewhc-1234-qb.pdf)
There, a benefit claimant family was described in published articles as "benefit scroungers" and various other derogatory terms. However, the Court ruled that, in addition to improperly pleading their claim, the claimants had not established any reputational or financial loss, and the claim was dismissed.
The Student who is the subject of this blog appears completely impervious to statute law and case law, and in her own little world of fantasy, everyone else is in the wrong - the OU, the students, the solicitors, the County Court, the High Court, the Police - and she is in the right. One day she may wake up, and finally realise that Law is clearly not a subject that she is capable of understanding.