Cracks In National Curling Manager's Defence See Him Fall 'Through The Ice'

The former Scottish women's curling skip, Gail Munro, has been successful in her defamation action against the former national team manager, Derek Brown. Lord Docherty found that Mr Brown had defamed Ms Munro and awarded her damages of £21,950.

Ms Munro was skipper of the Scotland team at the World Ladies Curling championships in Vernon, Canada in March 2008. Following a run of eight defeats Ms Munro did not play in the next game against Italy. Immediately after the Italy game Mr Brown gave a press conference at which he stated that Ms Munro had been given the opportunity to play against Italy but that she had refused to play.

Ms Munro claimed that what Mr Brown said was false and defamatory. She claimed that Mr Brown had dropped her from the team to play Italy. She was not given an opportunity to return to the ice and at no point did she refuse to play for Scotland. She was angered by the allegation and her reputation had been damaged. Mr Brown maintained that what he had said to journalists was true and relied on the defence of veritas.

The critical issue was what had been said in conversations between Ms Munro and Rhona Martin, the national team coach and gold medal winner at the 2002 Olympics, on the evening of 27th March and the following morning. The evidence showed that some of the language deployed during the hotel room conversation was as blue as the outer ring of the house.

Lord Doherty found that Ms Munro was doing her best to tell the truth and that she had been stung by the allegations and was still deeply hurt by them. Lord Doherty found that Ms Martin had not asked...