Laurence Fox guilty of libel over "paedophile" accusation

A judge has ruled that Laurence Fox libelled two people who he referred to as "paedophiles" on Twitter. The court case was brought against Fox by Stonewall charity trustee Simon Blake, and drag artist Crystal.

Fox used the term against Blake and Crystal - real name Colin Seymour - in October 2020 in a row about Sainsbury's decision to celebrate Black History Month.

A high court judge on Monday in favour of Blake and Seymour, and dismissed a counter claim by Fox targeting Nicola Thorp who had accused him of racism.

The judge said: "Mr Fox's labelling of Mr Blake and Mr Seymour as paedophiles was, on the evidence, probabilities and facts of this case, seriously harmful, defamatory and baseless. The law affords few defences to defamation of this sort.

"Mr Fox did not attempt to show these allegations were true, and he was not able to bring himself on the facts within the terms of any other defence recognised in law."

Patrick Green KC, representing Fox, previously argued that neither Blake nor Seymour had "suffered any actual, real-world consequences" due to the actor's tweets.

Fox told the court he was "horrified" when he saw he had been called a racist, which he later described as "a career-ending word and a reputation-destroying allegation". He said he faced a "significant decline" in the number and quality of roles he was offered after he was accused of being a racist.