Survivors of Ariana Grande Attack Win UK Harassment Case

A former television producer who says the attack was a fabrication lost a harassment lawsuit against two survivors of a deadly 2017 suicide attack on an Ariana Grande concert in northern England on Wednesday.

Richard Hall claimed in multiple videos and a book that the attack at the Manchester Arena, which claimed the lives of 22 people, was manufactured. Martin Hibbert and his daughter Eve sued Hall for harassment and data protection violations.

The two were seriously injured in the May 2017 attack by an Islamist fanatic, which also injured almost 100 other people.

While his daughter Eve, then 14 years old, sustained a serious brain injury, Martin Hibbert was paralyzed from the waist down.

Hall has asserted that “millions of people have bought a lie” about the attack and that his activities, which included taping Eve Hibbert outside her house, were in the public interest.

The High Court in London, characterizing him as an independent journalist and broadcaster, pointed out that he had asserted that “elements within the state and involving ordinary citizens (including the claimants)” were involved in the “deception.”

According to him, they acted as “crisis actors,” and the court stated that “no one was injured or died.”

Judge Karen Steyn found in a 63-page ruling that Hall had harassed the Hibberts with his “false narrative,” but she chose not to rule on the data protection issue at this time.

Hall had “abused media freedom,” according to Steyn, by stating his opinions for “commercial gain… sufficient to enable him to continue his work.”

He has made false accusations on numerous occasions over the years, ignoring the awful truth that so many common people have witnessed and basing them on the weakest analytical methods,” the judge wrote.

“All of this behavior naturally has the potential to cause significant distress, particularly when the targets are weaker.”

Before choosing the proper “relief” and the data protection claim, she will ask attorneys from both sides to provide “further submissions.”

Salman Abedi, a 22-year-old Manchester native of Libyan ancestry, committed the suicide bombing as concertgoers were exiting the Manchester Arena in northwest England.

Motivated by the Islamic State organization, he targeted groups of largely young people who were at the US pop star’s concert, as well as parents who had come to pick up their kids, with a homemade shrapnel bomb.

AFP