Solicitors at London firm Leigh Day were subjected to ‘abusive and offensive exchanges’ with the defendants in a defamation case brought on behalf of naturalist Chris Packham (pictured above), a High Court judgment revealed yesterday. The television presenter was awarded £90,000 in damages against online publication Country Squire Magazine, which falsely claimed he had defrauded donors to an animal sanctuary. 

In Packham v Wightman, Mr Justice Saini complimented solicitor Tessa Gregory for her handling of ‘gratuitously offensive’ comments.

In one such comment defendant Dominic Wightman, on behalf of all defendants, made a reference to finding a handwriting expert ‘this side of Basra’.

Saini said: ‘Why Basra? This was a gratuitously offensive reference to the legal representation by Tessa Gregory of Leigh Day of Iraqi civilians in wholly unrelated litigation.

‘Ms Gregory acts for Mr Packham in the present case. She had earlier worked at Public Interest Lawyers, a firm which, like Leigh Day, had acted in claims arising out of the Iraq war. Mr Packham’s case has nothing to do with Iraq or other clients of Ms Gregory.

‘To her credit Ms Gregory acted with exemplary professionalism and moderation in the firm’s responses to this (and a number of other pieces of offensive correspondence emanating from [Wightman] concerning representation of Iraqi civilians).

‘One of the great assets of the British legal system and its respect for the rule of law is that solicitors and barristers are not to be equated with their clients, current or former. [Wightman’s] approach showed an ignorance of this.’