The McLibel Trial

2 Pages 494 Words

In the mid 1980’s the small activist group London Greenpeace began a campaign against McDonalds, the main allegations said to be the feeling that McDonalds embodies everything wrong with the prevailing corporate mentality. In 1985 London Greenpeace organized the “International Day of Action Against McDonalds”, which is still held annually in Britain. The following year the organization began to distribute leaflets titled “What is wrong with McDonalds? – Everything they don’t want you to know.” In retaliation to this, McDonalds hired several private investigators to infiltrate the organization and provide names of the people heading this campaign. The investigators provided the names of five individuals who were mainly responsible for the slander of McDonalds. In 1990 McDonalds served libel writs against the five, offering them two options; either retract the statements made in the leaflet and apologize, or go on to court.
Three of the five apologized, knowing what they were up against, but three, Helen Steel and Dave Morris, refused and said they would go to court. Steel and Morris would be representing themselves, while McDonalds hired Richard Rampton, along with a very extensive legal team to represent the conglomerate. In 1993 Rampton applied to have the trial heard by only a judge, stating that ordinary citizens would not be able to comprehend the complicated issues that McDonalds proposed to use as evidence. The judge agreed and decided the trial could be held without a jury.
Steel and Morris now set out to prove that the statements in their leaflet were true, therefore they could not be construed as libelous. Under British law a libel case must be decided on the information provide by witness’s and documentary proof, so the defense had to round up their witness’s.
On June 28, 1994 the libel trial was finally started in the Royal Courts of Justice, London, presided over by Mr. Justice Bell. McDonald...