Marine identified as winner of High Court libel case against Police
As reported in The Times of 14 April 2025 (Marine wins libel case against police over false claims), Elliot Kebbie, then a Royal Marine, can be identified as the winner of a groundbreaking libel claim against West Yorkshire Police for an email they sent to the Royal Navy. The High Court found that the email alleged that Mr Kebbie was guilty of criminal offences.
Mark Henderson, instructed by Filiz Kiani of Cohen Davis, acted for Mr Kebbie. The claim ended in the Police paying £67,500 in libel and privacy damages and apologising in the High Court for the false allegations. Mr Kebbie secured a further £30,000 payout for a false imprisonment claim, in which he was represented by Nick Stanage on direct access (below).
The Times reported that “After years of grinding legal action, [Mr Kebbie] has won a landmark defamation case against West Yorkshire police — the first force in England to be found to have committed the highest level of defamation”.
The Police originally defended the claim on the basis that their statement to the Navy meant only that there were “grounds to suspect” him of the offences.
In a preliminary trial, Johnson J rejected their case, holding that the Police’s acknowledgment that Mr Kebbie might not be charged “simply reflects the fact that the decision-making in respect of charge was out of the police’s hands” and “does not alter the fact that the … police, for their part, were saying that the claimant had committed the offences.”
The Judge ruled that the statement to the Navy conveyed the following defamatory factual allegation against Mr Kebbie:
“The claimant has threatened and told blatant lies to his former partner, sending her emails which make threats, drawing on his military background to control her, and causing her to be scared that she is under constant surveillance and affecting her mental health. He has thereby committed an offence of controlling and coercive behaviour against his former partner and an offence against her of harassment.”
He also held that it conveyed the defamatory opinion that “His behaviour is not compatible with service in the armed forces.”
Following the preliminary trial, the Police filed a comprehensive Truth and Honest Opinion defence to the claim, claiming that the allegation that he committed the offences was true, that the opinion was supportable, and also that the publication of his private information was justified on public interest grounds.
Mr Kebbie filed a reply contesting all the defences and contending that the Truth defence aggravated the damage caused by the libellous email, especially in the context of the 16.5 months he had spent on police bail without charge and his pleaded case that the Police’s “apparent bias was influenced by racial stereotyping … resting on the common racist trope about young black men being aggressors”.
Following the Reply, the Police reversed their position and conceded liability in full. After several months of further work, damages for libel and breach of privacy were agreed in the sum of £67,500.
In the High Court hearing concluding the claim, Mr Henderson noted that: “The defamatory Statement was foreseeably republished, as Johnson J had concluded was intended, within His Majesty’s Armed Forces”. He explained that: “The Defendant is here today to set the record straight and to apologise unreservedly to the Claimant for the distress and embarrassment that the publication of the false allegations has caused him."
Counsel for West Yorkshire Police said that it “acknowledges that the factual allegations about the Claimant are untrue, and that the opinion expressed about him is insupportable” and “reiterates to the Claimant and to the Court that West Yorkshire Police are learning lessons from what occurred” and that “Revised procedures and safeguards have been implemented as a result of this case.” He added that: “The Defendant finally reiterates that West Yorkshire Police is committed to policing fairly and objectively, on behalf of all the communities it serves, and in that respect too, the way in which this particular situation was handled is sincerely regretted.”
As also reported in The Times, Mr Kebbie subsequently secured a further £30,000 in settlement of a false imprisonment claim against West Yorkshire Police.
He had claimed unlawful arrest, 7 hours' unlawful detention in a police cell, and that subsequent bail conditions were disproportionate, oppressive and of inordinate duration (16.5 months). He further contended that the Police were influenced by racial bias in their treatment of him. The false imprisonment settlement was six times what the Police originally offered Mr Kebbie as a litigant in person.
