Just how much freedom is allowed on the Internet has been tested in a court case in Dominica, in which a former beauty queen contestant has been awarded substantial damages.

In 2001 Marina Marshall, saying she felt violated, argued that she had been defamed in an email message circulated on the internet by three work colleagues.

Although her case was filed some eight years ago it was only heard in June of this year.

In a just published ruling, Justice Anthony Ross ordered the three defendants: Lenisha Augustine, Georgette George and Ann Marie James, to pay Ms Marshall EC$525,000 (appx US$190,000) in damages.

The award is reportedly the largest given to a claimant for defamation in the Eastern Caribbean Supreme Court. It is also the first case in the jurisdiction to find defendants liable for defamation in cyberspace.

Damaging emails

The court heard that the emails sent by the trio carried an attachment of a woman in a sexually explicit pose – Ms Marshall’s profile was superimposed onto the original photograph. The email carried a caption with a deeply offensive Creole word questioning her morals.

Marina Marshall dropped out of the beauty contest and lost her job because of the publicity surrounding the doctored photographs.

Not the first time

There have been other incidents of people’s reputations being tarnished online.

But it’s not always easy to identify the culprits.

Dominica police were informed in 2007 about material circulating on the internet that targeted a number of well-known women on the island, alleging they had been involved in sexually explicit acts and other immoral behaviour.

Some of the individuals named sought redress but the matter did not reach the courts because investigators could not determine who was behind the claims. (The offending email was traced to a computer cafe, but the author or sender remains unknown).

One of those targeted was a former beauty queen contestant who confessed to being traumatised by what she said was an unwarranted attack on her reputation.

Sending a clear message

In the Marina Marshall case Justice Ross said this was an action for damages based upon “the most disturbing and unfortunate set of facts”.

The judge felt “a clear message” needed to be sent to the three women involved, that such conduct would always be met with the “controlled disgust of the court”.

Dominican lawyer Lennox Lawrence represented Marina Marshall in the case.

He told BBC Caribbean that the judgement sets the tone for discussing the culpability of people who use the internet for defamatory purposes.

New laws coming

The authorities have over the past decade had difficulty responding to complaints about acts of defamation online.

In the wake of the Marshall case, Dominica’s Minister for Legal Affairs, Ian Douglas, has said the government will seek to introduce appropriate legislation. Mr Douglas says new e-legislation to go before the parliament will further strengthen efforts to tackle that type of online activity.

“We are working on four different pieces of internet legislation … we have the Electronic evidence Act and a couple other pieces of internet-related and electronically-related pieces of legislation,” Minister Douglas said.

He expects the bills to be “piloted through parliament very very soon”.

Reprinted with the kind permission of BBC Caribbean.com

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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