Case information

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Civil liability – Defamation – Damage – Evidence – Collective defamation – Whether Court of Appeal erred in finding that Applicants had not proved that defamatory statements had caused them “special damage”.

The Applicants are members of Falun Gong, a spiritual and religious movement that has tens of millions of followers in the world but also a number of detractors, including the Chinese government. In 2005, the Applicants, who were then 232 in number, brought an action in damages against the Respondents in which they claimed $100,000 each in compensation for damage they had allegedly suffered as a result of defamation. They alleged that they had been defamed by newspaper articles published by the Respondents in 2001 and 2002. The articles generally alleged that criminal and perverse practices were observed by the Falun Gong movement.

The Superior Court dismissed the action on the basis, inter alia, that the Applicants had not established that the allegations were false or grossly inaccurate or had been published to promote hatred or derision. On appeal, 214 of the appellants discontinued their appeals. The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal, noting that what was said was false and defamatory but that the Applicants had not proved they had suffered direct and actual damage as a result of the publication of the articles. Moreover, the fact that some of the Applicants had been referred to as followers of the movement [translation] “did not cause them special damage because Falun Gong is not a secret society and its followers have no objection to publicly acknowledging themselves as such” (para. 21 of the judgment).