Spitsnieuws Wins Case Concerning Expressions of James Sharpe About Term ‘Porn Baron’
Could Spitsnieuws call the former Member of Parliament for the
PVV James Sharpe ‘porn baron’ and ‘king of online porn’? That
question was the reason for the preliminary relief proceedings
which Sharpe initiated in 2011 against Spitsnieuws. In two articles
Spitsnieuws jokingly used the above-mentioned terms, with which it
referred to an affair around Sharpe’s activities in the past with,
inter alia, the Translease company, a business that had
registered various pornographic domain names in its name and also
exploited an online reference service for sex clubs and
brothels.
Sharpe’s claims in the first instance for damages and
rectification were
rejected by the Court of Amsterdam in
preliminary relief proceedings, but the Court did impose a ban
on Spitsnieuws not to call Sharpe porn baron or other names of
that purport in the future. This restriction of the freedom of
the press was a reason for Spitsnieuws to appeal against the
judgment. The Court of Appeal of Amsterdam rendered a
judgment on 20 December 2011.
The Court of Appeal ruled that it is sufficiently plausible that
in the period when Sharpe worked at Translease as business
development director (1996-2001), the company focused substantially
on the distribution of pornographic content. Sharpe himself said
about the title of business development director − which was
published in his CV on the PVV website − that it suggests more than
it actually is. This argument was ignored by the Court of Appeal:
the media could rely on the job description as mentioned in the CV,
and could ascribe a normal meaning thereto. In other words: the
media could assume that Sharpe indeed had a director's position
within Translease. Thus, the fact that he has ‘blown up’ the title
himself cannot be held against the media.
Furthermore, according to the Court of Appeal, Sharpe has
insufficiently substantiated that during the performance of his
position he had nothing to do with pornography and he did not hold
an influential position, although this would have been obvious for
him. All in all, according to the Court of Appeal there is
sufficient factual ground for the expressions. This, together with
the fact that as a (former) politician − who, moreover, does not
exclude his return to the Lower House of Parliament in the future −
Sharpe must have a thicker skin than an ordinary citizen, resulted
in the Court of Appeal's final rejection of all Sharpe’s
claims. The judgment was quashed.
In these proceedings Spitsnieuws was assisted by
Jens van den Brink and
Reindert van der Zaal of Kennedy Van der
Laan.