The loser in a defamation lawsuit against Jewish Countdown presenter Rachel Riley has vowed to appeal the decision in a new blog post following the result's announcement earlier this week.
In a blog post entitled "The Riley libel case is NOT over – I’m planning an appeal", Michael Sivier, who has raised over £230,000 to fight his thus far unsuccessful libel defence, asks for more money for the next stage of his legal action.
He wrote: "My defence has always been a group effort. I would not have been able to get as far as I did without your help and, without it, I will not be able to go any further.
"I notice some of you have already donated more money into the CrowdJustice fund and I am grateful – all the more so because we all have so much less disposable cash now, thanks to the blunders of our political so-called leaders."
On Friday, it was announced that Riley has been awarded £50,000 in damages after winning her defamation case against Sivier who accused her of abusing a 16-year-old girl on social media.
The Countdown star sued Mr Sivier over a 2019 article about a Twitter debate on antisemitism in the Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn's leadership, which Ms Riley said had triggered online abuse.
Mr Sivier claimed that his article was in the public interest, however in her ruling on Wednesday morning, Mrs Justice Steyn said that although Mr Sivier believed and continued to believe that his article was in the public interest, that belief was "wholly unreasonable" that had no basis in the evidence.
In a statement following her victory, Ms Riley accused Mr Sivier of "misleading some extremely vulnerable people into giving him their money" to fund his case, despite her offer to "pay £1k to a children’s charity and £4k of court fees to settle the matter, which he decided not to disclose during his extensive blogging and grifting".
She added: "In the unlikely event that Sivier pays the £50k the court has awarded, any money I may receive will go to charity as has always been the plan. My motivation has always been to combat the lies which has been achieved through due legal process today."
