Jones awarded $104,000 in defamation case

Sir Robert Jones said the article effectively accused him of committing one of NZ's worst commercial crimes. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Property tycoon Sir Robert Jones has been awarded $104,000 for the hurt he suffered over a critical article which suggested he had inflated his investment company's assets to increase his management fee.

Sir Robert today won his defamation case in the High Court at Wellington against the article's author, Kapiti Coast investment adviser Chris Lee.

He had been seeking up to $800,000 in damages.

The article, published in Wellington community paper City Life in April 2007, criticised a contract between Robert Jones Holdings and Robert Jones Investments.

Sir Robert told the court on Tuesday he had given Mr Lee the opportunity to apologise or retract his statement but he did not.

He said the "scurrilous" article effectively accused him of committing "one of the worst commercial crimes in our history".

"He's entitled to express an opinion but he overstated the truth by 1100 per cent.

"When he slurs like he did about me, I'm going to do something about it"

The management contract that the article was referring to was between Sir Robert's then publicly listed company, Robt Jones Investments Limited, and his private company, Robt Jones Holdings Limited. The public company paid the private company a fee each year in return for providing management services.

In Mr Lee's article, he criticised a similar agreement proposed between the NZX and its chief executive, Mark Weldon, using the agreement between Sir Robert's companies as an example of a management contract that was not in the interest of shareholders.

Mr Lee's lawyer, Matthew McClelland, earlier told the court his client had already written a correction and admitted there were errors in the article.

He had also apologised for an article he wrote in 2000 claiming Sir Robert was prosecuted for insider trading.

Mr McClelland said Sir Robert could expect to be criticised for his business decisions, as a prominent New Zealand commentator.

He said Mr Lee had written the article because of a desire to protect investors and shareholders in the company.

- NZPA