03/02/2020 Reachlocal UK Ltd & Anor v Bennett & Ors [2014] EWHC 3405 (QB) (21 October 2014) 24. Richard Bray's evidence is that in the course of that conversation, which was recorded by the ReachLocal representative and the transcript of which is exhibited to Mr Bray's first witness statement, the person calling himself Craig Anderson said this: 'So I made about 50 companies aware of ReachLocal so far and out of that 50 at least 40 of those have come back to me via email, text message or a call saying thank you very much Jamie. You know this is the way it works you know, this is the problem. Just said his name there, I'm sorry. So yeah, ignore who I just said there'. As Mr Bray observes, the person calling himself 'Craig Anderson' admitted – before attempting to dig himself out of the error – that his real name was 'Jamie'. It appears, therefore, that the second and first defendants are probably one and the same person, which is the claimants' pleaded case. It is worth noting that the first defendant attended the hearing of the application for interim relief on 28 March 2014, and produced to the court an email sent to the claimants' solicitors that day saying that he was not Craig Anderson. He told Sir David Eady that he would produce a witness statement confirming the substance of his email and what he told the court by 22 April. In the event, he failed to do so. 25. The inference is invited that very similar words will have been spoken in other conversations which the defendants (primarily, no doubt, the first or second defendant) have had with a very large number of the claimants' actual and potential customers by way of a mass telephone campaign. 26. That is not a difficult inference to draw. The first defendant, in particular, has been brazen about his conduct: in answer to a letter dated 21 March 2014 from the claimants' solicitors serving the application for interim relief, he replied saying '… further Jedi attacks will continue, must rush, have a proposal to do for another ReachLocal client'. 27. In an earlier email dated 11 March 2014, he made clear admissions: "… your client has left themselves open for attack and it would be foolish of [ReachLocal] to think that they can openly mis sell services and products without retaliation from competitors as is the case in the United States already. The UK is only just waking up the practices of your client and all we are doing is arming the consumer / companies with the knowledge required for them to make an informed decision. There are only 2 ways that the current series of events can go namely we continue to actively target [ReachLocal] clients from the info we have obtained which is in the public domain and hence no legal action can successfully be taken against us or [ReachLocal] comes to a financial arrangement with us whereby we agree to no longer actively target current or future [ReachLocal] clients in return for financial remuneration within the remit of a legal and valid commercial agreement between the 2 parties. We await to hear from you as to what your clients decision will be. In the meantime we will continue to actively target [ReachLocal] clients with the current campaign of mailshots and press releases. Further Jedi attacks are imminent the Force is Strong with this one…" 28. The first defendant, it will be seen, relishes the Star Wars theme. Apart from his Jedi references and the name formed by the initials of the fifth defendant, some of his emails are illustrated with pictures of Star Wars space ships. 29. The evidence of Mr Bray, to whom some of the emails complained of were forwarded by customers, shows that what seems actually to have happened on at least some occasions was that the person calling himself Craig Anderson would first call the customer, claiming to be an independent 'pay per click' expert who believed in 'ethical business practices', and would tell the customer how it was being 'scammed' by ReachLocal. That call, it appears, would then be followed by an email attaching the pdf. In other words, the campaign of denigration of which the claimants complain was a mixture of telephone calls and emails. Meaning 30. One four-part meaning is pleaded for all the various publications relied on, all of which are said to be both defamatory and untrue. The untruth of the words complained of is of course presumed in the claimants' favour. However, I note the very full rebuttal of the defendants' claims in Mr Richard Bray's first witness statement, which no doubt persuaded Sir David Eady to grant interim injunctions. Had the defendants given Sir David reason to believe that they were in a position to defend their allegations as www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/QB/2014/3405.html 7/14