Investment adviser ordered to pay around $80,000

Chris Lee. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Kapiti Coast investment adviser Chris Lee has been ordered to pay property magnate Sir Robert Jones around $80,000 towards his defamation court costs.

However, Sir Robert failed to convince High Court judge Justice Denis Clifford that he should receive indemnity, or increased, costs.

In May a jury in the High Court at Wellington made a $104,000 defamation award against Mr Lee.

It found that articles on his website and various other publications were motivated by ill-will towards Sir Robert.

Sir Robert had claimed around $800,000 damages.

In seeking indemnity costs, Sir Robert's lawyers said that Mr Lee had acted vexatiously, frivolously, or improperly in going to trial when he should have settled prior.

However, the judge said he did not consider that Mr Lee's conduct in defending the case merited an award of indemnity costs.

The issue was whether in defending the case Mr Lee knew, or ought to have known, that he was "embarking on a claim that was bordering on the hopeless".

Justice Clifford ordered Mr Lee to pay Sir Robert $82,713, reduced by an appropriate amount in relation to Mr Lee's costs at a preliminary hearing before Justice Forrest Miller.

- NZPA