The Life and libel

Today's session with Ian Anderson on Defamation and Libel took me back twelve years to the 19-day libel action brought by horse-racing trainer Lynda Ramsden and her husband Jack, and former Champion Jockey Kieren Fallon against the much-lamented Sporting Life newspaper.  In an article published in May of 1995,  after the horse, Top Cees, won the valuable Chester Cup handicap, a comment column written by Alastair Down was entitled 'Contempt for the punter'.  In it he alleged that in a previous run, at Newmarket three weeks earlier, the Ramsdens and Fallon had been 'cheating' and that the horse hadn't been allowed to do as well at it might have done, presumably to protect its handicap mark for a later day.



Former trainer Lynda Ramsden

In this particular case it was unusual in that it touched on an area that I know a little bit about - I'd interviewed Jack Ramsden on several occasions, and had spoken less frequently to Alastair Down.  I had no doubt that Down was sincere in his view, but I was equally sure that it was a crazy thing to have written, and I was always of the view that the Ramsdens and Fallon would succeed in their action, and so it proved.

Jack Ramsden liked their horses to be ridden from off the pace, finishing with a flourish: that way if they were good enough they'd win, but not by too far, and if they weren't good enough then they didn't win.  The Ramsden horses were predominantly handicappers and only a fool would let them win by miles, or race prominently and fade late on.  Both of those approaches lead to the horses handicap mark (which determines the weight that it will carry in future races) going up sharply, and would therefore detract from its chance of winning again.  There is absolutely nothing wrong with running horses that way - in fact, I'd argue that to do anything else is daft.

The jury watched Top Cees' Newmarket race on more than 100 occasions, and it was no  surprise when the plaintiffs won their case, costing the 'Life' £195,000 in damages, although with costs their bill was probably over £700,000 - a tidy sum at 1998 prices.

The paper's defences were justification (that the allegation was true) and fair comment, and neither had, in my view at the time, the slightest chance of succeeding.   Fallon, whose career has been dogged by controversy, went on to become Champion Jockey, and Lynda Ramsden retired from training shortly after the trial, although Jack now sits on the board of Chester racecourse where Top Cees had his biggest success.  The Sporting Life was merged with The Racing Post just three months after the libel trial and disappeared off the shelves.  Top Cees was injured in the 2000 running of the Chester Cup but survived and was retired.

It took almost three years for the case to come to court, it cost an arm and a leg, and it put a number of people through dreadful stress - was it worth it?  For the plaintiffs it was because they had been libelled and needed to clear their names, but the cost to the paper was enormous and entirely avoidable.