The family of convicted Australian drug smuggler Schapelle Corby has been awarded nearly $1 million in defamation damages over claims father Mick operated a drug syndicate.
Sins of the Father, a book released by Fairfax journalist Eammon Duff in 2012, claimed Schapelle’s sister, brother and mother were part of a drug syndicate.
The book alleged Mick regularly bought marijuana from a drug syndicate in South Australia and also that Queensland police received a tip off Mick would be smuggling drugs into Bali in the weeks before Schapelle Corby was arrested.
Schapelle’s mother Rosleigh Rose has been awarded $190,000, coming after daughter Mercedes received $175,000 and son Michael received $150,000 in separate cases.
But Rose told Sunrise on Friday morning she wasn’t happy with the settlement and wanted publishers Allen & Unwin and Duff to face criminal charges.
“I didn’t want what the publishers and Eammon Duff have done to be swept under the carpet,” she said.
“There’s over 60 years of experience between them and they can do this and no charges are laid?
“How come this person, a maggot I’ll call him, I don’t like to say his name, could write this book of lies and get it printed with these publishers?” she asked of Duff, who she claims never contacted the family.
Allen & Unwin was forced to pay close to $400,000 in legal costs and remove the book from shelves.
“This book was riddled with incorrect facts about my family – facts that could have been easily checked but were not,” Mercedes said after being awarded $175,000 last year.
“Had my father been alive, this book would never have been published. There is no legal avenue for the family of a dead person who has been defamed to vindicate their loved-one’s reputation.
“My father was a good man who worked hard in the mines most of his adult life before succumbing to cancer. The allegations made about him in this book are false and were devastating to his family.”
Source:au.news.yahoo.com
STUDIO 3 NEWCASTLE AUSTRALIA 