Mosley v News Group Newspapers

Mosley v News Group Newspapers
Court	High Court
Full case name	Max Mosley v News Group Newspapers Limited
Decided	24 July 2008
Citation(s)	[2008] EWHC 1777 (QB), (2008) Times, 30 July
Transcript(s)	Max Mosley v News Group Newspapers Limited
Case history
Prior action(s)	None
Court membership
Judge(s) sitting	David Eady

Mosley v News Group Newspapers [2008] EWHC 1777 (QB) was an English High Court case in which the former President of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile, Max Mosley, challenged the News of the World. The newspaper had exposed his involvement in what it called a Nazi-themed sadomasochistic sex act involving several female prostitutes when they published a video of the incident recorded by one of the women and published details of the incident in their newspaper. The case resulted in Mosley being awarded £60,000 (approx. US$92,000) in damages.

The claimant, Max Mosley, had been President of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile since 1993 as well as being a trustee of its charitable arm the FIA Foundation. He brought legal action against News Group Newspapers Ltd, the publishers of the News of the World newspaper, complaining about an article by journalist Neville Thurlbeck published on 30 March 2008. The headline of the article was "F1 Boss has Sick Nazi Orgy with Five Hookers". This was accompanied by the sub-heading "Son of Hitler-loving fascist in sex shame". Mosley is the son of Oswald Mosley, who was the leader of the British Union of Fascists during the 1930s. Mosley relied upon an action based upon breach of confidence or the unauthorised disclosure of personal information rather than defamation. Mosley claimed that sexual or sadomasochistic activities were inherently private in nature and that their portrayal was an invasion of privacy by reason of a preexisting relationship of confidentiality between the participants.

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