In Hoax Suit, Judge Grants Award to Injured Man, Daughter

A father and daughter seriously injured by a suicide bomber who killed 22 people after an Ariana Grande concert in England in 2017 were awarded $58,000 on Friday in a case against a former television producer who claimed the attack was a hoax. Martin Hibbert and his daughter, Eve, won their harassment suit in the High Court in London last month against Richard Hall for videos, a film, and a book he produced that falsely claim the Manchester Arena bombing was staged using actors and that no one was hurt or killed. Hibbert was paralyzed from the waist down in the bombing, the AP reports, and his daughter, who was 14 at the time, suffered severe brain damage.

Hall, an independent producer, had claimed "millions of people have bought a lie" about the attack and defended his work, including surreptitiously filming the daughter, as journalism in the public's interest. Justice Karen Steyn called Hall's conduct a "negligent, indeed reckless, abuse of media freedom." She said he used the "flimsiest of analytical techniques" to dismiss "the obvious, tragic reality to which so many ordinary people have attested." The killer blew himself up with a bomb hidden in a knapsack as fans were leaving the concert on May 22, 2017. In addition to those killed, more than 260 people were wounded, and hundreds of others were left with "deep psychological injuries," police said.

The Hibberts also won an injunction preventing Hall from further harassment, and Hall will have to pay 90% of their legal costs that are estimated at $335,000. The award is meager compared to many won in similar US lawsuits, per the AP. Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones was ordered to pay $1.5 billion to parents of children killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut in 2012 for falsely claiming the shooting was a hoax. Martin Hibbert said that he never expects to see a penny of the award but that the case wasn't about money. "What this was about was bringing him down in public, in front of his own followers," he said outside court. As he left court, Hall said the trial was unfair and again insisted the bombing didn't happen.

(More Manchester stories.)