Stocker v Stocker

Hilary Term

[2019] UKSC 17

On appeal from: [2018] EWCA Civ 170

JUDGMENT

LORD KERR: ( with whom Lord Reed, Lady Black, Lord Briggs and Lord Kitchin agree)

1.                   “He tried to strangle me.” What would those words convey to the “ordinary reasonable reader” of a Facebook post?

Background

2.                   The respondent to this appeal, Ronald Stocker, is the former husband of the appellant, Nicola Stocker. Their marriage ended in acrimony in 2012. Mr Stocker subsequently formed a relationship with Ms Deborah Bligh. On 23 December 2012 an exchange took place between Mrs Stocker and Ms Bligh on the Facebook website. In the course of that exchange, Mrs Stocker informed Ms Bligh that her former husband (now Ms Bligh’s partner) had tried to strangle her. It is now clear that the date on which this is alleged to have occurred is 23 March 2003.

3.                   Mrs Stocker also said that her husband had been removed from the house following a number of threats that he had made; that there were some “gun issues”; and that the police felt that he had broken the terms of a non-molestation order. These statements and the allegation that Mr Stocker had tried to strangle her were the basis on which he took proceedings against her for defamation.

4.                   The allegations about threats, gun issues and the breach of a non-molestation order are relevant to provide context to the statement that Mr Stocker had tried to strangle Mrs Stocker. They paint a picture of acute marital conflict and on that account set the scene for any reader of the Facebook post. That reader would know that Mrs Stocker’s statement that her former husband had tried to strangle her was made against the background that this had been, towards the end of its life, a most disharmonious marriage.

The proceedings in the High Court

5.                   Mr Stocker issued proceedings against his former wife, claiming that the statement that he had tried to strangle her was defamatory of him. He claimed that the meaning to be given to the words “tried to strangle me” was that he had tried to kill her. Mrs Stocker denied that the words bore that meaning. She claimed that, in the context of domestic violence, the words do not impute an intention to kill. What they would be understood to mean, she said, was that her husband had violently gripped her neck, inhibiting her breathing so as to put her in fear of being killed.

6.                   Mr Stocker also claimed that the statement that he had uttered threats and breached a non-molestation order was defamatory and was to be taken as implying that he was a dangerous and thoroughly disreputable…