Buying Silence - David Hooper

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Résumé :
In this timely, insightful and often shocking book, David Hooper, veteran media lawyer, explores how the power of money enables the very wealthy - including Robert Maxwell, Nadhim Zahawi and McDonald's - to crush their critics through SLAPP tactics.

Biographie:
David Hooper is a leading media lawyer, having worked with publishers and newspapers in the UK and the US. He has represented a President, a Prime Minister, MPs, authors, journalists, academics, sportsmen, actors, film directors, doctors and industrialists but always acts against rather than for oligarchs. His previous works include Public Scandal, Odium and Contempt, Official Secrets: The Use and Abuse of the Act and Reputations Under Fire: Winners and Losers in the Libel Business. He lives in Monmouthshire, Wales.

Sommaire:
This timely and important book focuses on the controversial issue of SLAPP cases - Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation - which are designed to censor, intimidate and silence critics by burdening them with aggressive opposing lawyers, heavy legal costs and enquiry agents until they abandon the case. David Hooper, veteran media lawyer, explores how the power of money enabled the very wealthy to crush their critics and outlines the tactics they used. He examines how billionaire oligarchs, often ex-convicts and linked to organised crime, have tried to launder their reputation in this country by suing for libel, and how they have found lawyers only too happy to pocket their roubles. Hooper describes his experience with some of these oligarchs, including Boris Berezovsky when Hooper needed an armed bodyguard while collecting evidence in Moscow. It was a case where both plaintiffs were ultimately murdered, as was his client, the editor of Forbes Russia. The UK also has its home-grown Slappsters, of whom Nadhim Zahawi and Mohamed Amersi are the most recent examples. They also come from Greece, Sweden, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Malta and the United States. Hooper describes how those with something to hide tried, with varying degrees of success, to stop you knowing about it, and how their lawyers were willing to help them. The well-paid legal profession does not emerge with credit....