Latest news with #highcourt
The Guardian
6 hours ago
- Business
- The Guardian
Wikipedia can challenge Online Safety Act if strictest rules apply to it, says judge
The operator of Wikipedia has been given permission by a high court judge to challenge the Online Safety Act if it is categorised as a high-risk platform, which would impose the most stringent duties. The Wikimedia Foundation has said it will be forced to reduce how many people can access the site in order to comply with the regulations if it is classified as a category 1 provider by Ofcom later this summer. As a non-profit, the site said, it 'would face huge challenges to meet the large technological and staffing needs' required to comply with the duties, which include user-verification requirements, stringent protections for users and regular reporting responsibilities to prevent the spread of harmful content. The Wikimedia Foundation calculated that the number of people in the UK who access Wikipedia would have to be reduced by about three-quarters in order for the site to not qualify as a category 1 service, which is defined as a large user-to-user platform that uses algorithmic contender recommendations. It said Wikipedia was different to other sites expected to be labelled category 1 providers such as Facebook, X and Instagram because it was run by a charity and its users typically only encountered content that they sought out. Justice Johnson refused Wikipedia's legal challenge in the high court on several grounds, but he noted that the site 'provides significant value for freedom of speech and expression' and added that the outcome did not give Ofcom or the government 'a green light to implement a regime that would significantly impede Wikipedia's operations'. Any decision to make Wikipedia a category 1 provider would have to be 'justified as proportionate if it were not to amount to a breach of the right to freedom of expression', he said, but added that it would be 'premature' to rule on this since Ofcom had not yet determined that Wikipedia was a category 1 service. If Ofcom determines that Wikipedia is a category 1 service and this means Wikipedia is unable to operate as at present, Johnson suggested that the technology secretary, Peter Kyle, should 'consider whether to amend the regulations or to exempt categories of service from the act' and said that Wikipedia could bring a further challenge if he did not. Phil Bradley-Schmieg, the lead counsel at the Wikimedia Foundation, said: 'While the decision does not provide the immediate legal protections for Wikipedia that we hoped for, the court's ruling emphasised the responsibility of Ofcom and the UK government to ensure Wikipedia is protected as the OSA [Online Safety Act] is implemented. Sign up to First Edition Our morning email breaks down the key stories of the day, telling you what's happening and why it matters after newsletter promotion 'The judge recognised the 'significant value' of Wikipedia, its safety for users, as well as the damages that wrongly assigned OSA categorisations and duties could have on the human rights of Wikipedia's volunteer contributors.' Cecilia Ivimy KC, for the government, said ministers reviewed Ofcom guidance and considered specifically whether Wikipedia should be exempt from the regulations and rejected that. She said they decided that Wikipedia 'is in principle an appropriate service on which to impose category 1 duties' and how ministers arrived at that choice was not 'without reasonable foundation nor irrational'.
The Herald
3 days ago
- Politics
- The Herald
High court orders repatriation of ex-Zambian leader Edgar Lungu's body
The Pretoria high court on Friday ordered the repatriation of former Zambian president Edgar Lungu's body for a state funeral, siding with Zambia's government over his family who wanted him buried in South Africa, not in the presence of his successor. Lungu, Zambia's head of state from 2015 to 2021, died in South Africa on June 5 while receiving medical treatment. The high court halted plans for Lungu to be buried in Johannesburg on June 25, hours before a private ceremony was due to start. Zambia's government had approached the court arguing that Lungu should be given a state funeral and buried at a designated site in the Zambian capital Lusaka, like all other presidents since independence from Britain in 1964. Lungu's family said he did not want incumbent President Hakainde Hichilema, a long-standing political rival and his successor, at his funeral.
The Guardian
28-07-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Will of man suspected of being army's IRA spy Stakeknife to be sealed, high court rules
The will of the man alleged to have been Britain's top agent inside the Provisional IRA is not to be made public, the high court has ruled in a legal first. Ordering that the will of Freddie Scappaticci, who is suspected of being the mole known as Stakeknife, should not be open for public inspection as is usual, Sir Julian Flaux said it was the first time this had been done for a person who was not a member of the royal family. Scappaticci, who was accused of torturing and murdering several victims while simultaneously running an IRA enforcement unit and working for the British state in the 1980s, died in hiding in April 2023 at the age of 77. He always denied being Stakeknife. In his ruling, published on Monday, Flaux said a hearing to decide whether the will should be sealed was held in private on 21 July. The application was made by a man named Michael Johnson, who had said he was prepared to act as Scappaticci's representative providing that the will was sealed. Christopher Buckley, acting for Johnson, had told the court that making the will public would be both 'undesirable' and 'inappropriate'. A barrister for the attorney general, who represents the public interest, had supported the application. Flaux said: 'There is nothing in the will, which is in fairly standard form, which could conceivably be of interest to the public or the media.' He added that there was 'the need to protect the applicant and those named in the will from the real risk of serious physical harm or even death because they might be thought to be guilty by association with the deceased'. This was demonstrated, the judge said, by 'the real risk to his life and wellbeing which the deceased faced in his lifetime'. He ordered the will should be sealed for 70 years. A seven-year investigation into Stakeknife – alleged to have been the highest-ranking British intelligence agent in the IRA during the Northern Ireland Troubles – published last year found that more lives were lost than saved because of his activities. Scappaticci, from west Belfast, was not named as the agent in the report. Scappaticci, who went into hiding in England after his identity was revealed in 2003 by the media, failed in a legal attempt to force the government to publicly state that he was not Stakeknife. He was linked to more than a dozen murders during his time as a senior member of the Provisional IRA's ruthless internal security unit known as 'the nutting squad', which was tasked with identifying and killing security force informers. Flaux said in his judgment: 'The allegation that the deceased was working for the British government was particularly inflammatory in the Catholic community in Northern Ireland given that he was alleged to have been responsible within the IRA for dealing with individuals accused of spying on the IRA.' In 2022, the Guardian revealed that senior government officials privately believed that the practice of keeping secret the wills of the royal family was legally questionable and warned ministers not to discuss it in parliament. The same year, the court of appeal dismissed a legal challenge by the Guardian to the exclusion of the media from a secret court hearing in which a judge banned the public from inspecting Prince Philip's will.
Telegraph
21-07-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
£2m bill for legal battle between Earl Spencer's ex-wife and girlfriend
The legal battle between Earl Spencer's estranged wife and his new girlfriend is set to cost more than £2m, a court has heard. Cat Jarman, who has been dating the brother of Diana, Princess of Wales, for almost a year, is suing his third wife after accusing her of sharing private medical information. The Norwegian archaeologist, 43, lodged a High Court claim against Countess Karen Spencer, the Earl's wife of 13 years, last October. She has since alleged that she was forced to reveal her multiple sclerosis (MS) diagnosis in a high-profile newspaper interview to end gossip online. On Monday, Master Mark Gidden heard that both parties had reached an agreement on future estimated legal costs amounting to more than £2.2m. Kirsten Sjovoll, for Jarman, told the judge the overall agreed future costs for the claimant stood at £1,217,880, while the defendant's legal costs were £1,000,087. The court did not hear how much Jarman is suing the Countess for. The barrister claimed the defendant's legal costs were 'excessively high', noting that Countess Spencer's tally was already exceeding more than half a million. Master Gidden disagreed, noting: 'To my mind, they are costs falling within a range that is to be expected.' Speaking about the apparent discrepancy in spending, Clara Hamer, for Countess Spencer, said: 'Just on the big picture point…when you're dealing with a case of this magnitude and the issues involved that's not such a great gulf.' She claimed Countess Spencer's legal costs so far amounted to £511,404, while Jarman's were £329,365. 'The court is not a slave to comparison,' she went on, adding: 'Similar work in the hands of different legal teams may result in different costs.' Jarman previously revealed she had 'worked very hard indeed' to keep her MS diagnosis hidden from many people she knew, including the Earl, 61, in the early days of their relationship. When she lodged the court case in Autumn last year, the details of her diagnosis remained confidential. She later gave an interview to MailOnline in which she revealed she had the condition, and said in court documents that she was concerned about her 'loss of autonomy and control' over her own medical information. Countess Spencer, meanwhile, accused her estranged husband and Jarman of attempting to 'garner publicity for their relationship' in the press. She said Jarman's decision to give an interview to MailOnline in which she revealed her diagnosis was 'hopelessly inconsistent' with her legal case. 'Deliberately disclosing the fact that she has MS to the world in a manner calculated to give it maximum publicity is not only entirely inconsistent with any claim to privacy, but it also nullifies the ostensible purpose of these proceedings,' the defence reads. The Countess, who was married to the Earl for 13 years and shares a daughter with him, has robustly defended herself against Jarman's allegations. She and the Earl are in the midst of divorce proceedings. The Earl confirmed he was in a relationship with Jarman live on ITV's Good Morning Britain in October last year. The couple later gave an interview about their relationship in November, during which he said she 'brings out the best in me'.
Daily Mail
19-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
EXCLUSIVE Ex-wife of super rich equity boss was fighting her celebrity antiques dealer fiance for their £2.7m 18th century London home when she fell to her death from tower block
A mother who fell to her death from a city centre apartment block was embroiled in a bitter legal fight with her celebrity antiques dealer fiancé over their £2.7million London home. Rachel O'Hare, 49, was suing her ex-lover Owen Pacey, 60, for ownership of the five-storey Georgian mansion, in the trendy area of Spitalfields, before she died. According to court documents seen by the Mail, she claims she paid for the property and it was rightfully hers. Ms O'Hare alleged that Mr Pacey, a former squatter and self-made antique fireplace expert who counts Mick Jagger, Naomi Campbell, Kate Winslet and Orlando Bloom among his clients, had locked her out of the luxury home. She says he stopped her from collecting her belongings, refused to pay any bills and threatened to 'trash' the interior, which is packed with beautiful artwork, ornate Italian chandeliers and expensive designer furniture. The couple, who split acrimoniously in May last year, were due to go head to head over the property at a High Court trial in the next few months. But just four days after the most recent hearing in the case, at Leeds Combined Court, on June 26, Ms O'Hare was found dead. The exact details of what happened during the costs and case management hearing are unknown, but on June 30 her body was discovered on the pavement next to an apartment complex, in Manchester city centre, where she was living. Police said there are no suspicious circumstances and an inquest into her death is due to open next week. In a statement to the court, Ms O'Hare claimed Mr Pacey persuaded her to buy the elegant 18th Century house, in Wilkes Street, east London, in their joint names, in June 2021. She took out a loan and also used the proceeds of her divorce settlement from ex-husband, Steve O'Hare, 50, a Cheshire-based millionaire investment manager, with whom she had three teenage children, to pay for it. At that time, she and Mr Pacey had been together for less than a year following a whirlwind romance after meeting at his high-end fireplace showroom, Renaissance, which is based in a former Victorian pub, in Shoreditch, east London. Legal papers seen by MailOnline show that when the former couple bought the house together in 2021, they both signed an agreement specifying that if one of them were to die, ownership of the house would pass to the surviving partner The documents, drawn up by the solicitors who had handled the purchase of the historic Spitalfields house, had offered Mr Pacey and Ms O'Hare two options: they could either each own a specified proportion of the whole property or they could jointly own the whole with full ownership reverting to the surviving partner if the other predeceased them. Because they chase the latter option, the documents, signed on 1st August 2021, mean Owen Pacey became the sole owner of the £2.7 million 18th property in London following Rachel O'Hare's sudden death. In a newspaper interview while they were still a couple, Mr Pacey claimed it was love at first sight when they first met. 'She bought a table,' he said. 'That was it, as soon as I saw her.' Ms O'Hare said Mr Pacey, who was brought up in a council flat in gritty Bethnal Green and left school at 14 with no qualifications, promised to pay her his share of the four-bedroomed property within two years, once he had sold the £1.2million maisonette above the shop that he owned. 'The first defendant (Mr Pacey) said he had no money to contribute when the property was purchased but would be able to pay the claimant for his share in due course,' legal documents said. To give her peace of mind, Ms O'Hare said Mr Pacey also agreed to put half of his fireplace business, worth around £5million, in her name until he secured the monies. She also claimed they agreed to share the cost of renovating the house – they spent £14,000 on radiator valves alone – and, if he didn't pay his share or they split, it would revert back to her ownership. Mr Pacey gave her paperwork to sign, which persuaded her he was arranging the legal formalities, and also sent her reassuring texts, saying: 'You are on the title deed either of the flat or shop,' she said. Steve O'Hare (left) is co-managing partner of Equistone Partners Europe. Tributes have poured in for Rachel (right) who co-founded a charity for victims of domestic violence Shortly before Christmas, in 2022, the couple got engaged and Mr Pacey did 'gift' Ms O'Hare a 50 per cent share in the three-bedroomed maisonette. He moved into the newly renovated Wilkes Street property and told a journalist: 'I used to dream about living in Spitalfields. To actually live there now – I've never been so happy.' But Ms O'Hare remained in Mere, Cheshire, with her three school-age children and 10 months later, in October 2023, the couple's 'turbulent' relationship started hitting the rocks. Ms O'Hare discovered Mr Pacey had never formalised her 50 per cent stake in his business and they began arguing regularly over money. She claimed she had ended up paying the lion's share of the house refurbishment when he failed to pay builders' fees. She also alleged Mr Pacey was 'controlling' and instructed lawyers to begin legal action against him. 'The relationship between the claimant (Ms O'Hare) and the first defendant (Mr Pacey) was turbulent,' Ms O'Hare's claim said. 'Incidents led to temporary separations and there was a final and unequivocal parting in May 2024. 'The claimant contends that the cause of the breakdowns was the first defendant's controlling and abusive behaviour, which led to the involvement of the police.' In a defence statement also submitted to the court, Mr Pacey denied persuading Ms O'Hare, a respected fundraiser who set up a domestic abuse charity providing toiletries for women living in refuges, to buy the house in their joint names. He said she did so because they were 'in love' and there was no discussion or agreement about him eventually paying for half of the house or transferring over 50 per cent of his business. 'The parties (Ms O'Hare and Mr Pacey) were going to get married and there was just no discussion about who owned what,' his defence document said. Mr Pacey, who once described being made homeless and forced to live in a squat in King's Cross after having his first flat repossessed in the 1980s as the 'most traumatic thing I've ever been through,' also denied being controlling. He said they had only argued seriously twice - both times when Ms O'Hare had been drunk, in Rye, Kent, in the summer of 2023 and the night before they were departing to New York in May 2024. He also denied not allowing Ms O'Hare access to the property, now estimated to be worth in excess of £3.2m, or not paying bills or threatening to trash it. He claimed he paid £70,000 towards the house renovation and provided most of the furniture from his shop. He had also installed six Italian marble fireplaces, worth £350,000, and claimed Ms O'Hare had organised glossy magazine features to show off and promote the 2,700sq ft house, which they planned to rent out for use in £1,000-a-day photo shoots. According to his statement, dated February this year, he wanted to get the maisonette and the Georgian home valued, so that he could buy her out of both properties. When approached by the Mail, Mr Pacey refused to discuss his legal dispute with his former fiancee except to say: 'I worshipped the ground Rachel walked on.' He added that Ms O'Hare had been suffering from poor mental health in the weeks leading up to her death and had recently been treated in hospital. Mr Pacey said: 'I'm suffering with my own mental health. I don't want to be here without her.'
