A Defamation Trial Overview by Mr. Garry Linnell

This article was posted on the FreeSchapelle Forum and originated from the Herald Sun. Curse words aside, I found it a fascinating article. It provides an excellent overview of the history of the defamation trial, and Mr. Linnell, the author, presents both Mercedes' and Jodie's sides well. Written with an excellent writing style, which we here at HLJ just love, the article is quite an enjoyable and informative read.

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Mercedes Corby defamation case a real-life drama

Garry Linnell

May 10, 2008 12:00am

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,23673392-662,00.html

The Mercedes Corby defamation case has shown well-aimed mud will always stick, writes Garry Linnell.

WHEN the first chill nights arrive heralding the coming of another winter, Rosleigh Rose makes her way into the kitchen and starts preparing tomato jam. She likes the stuff.

"Has a bit of a kick to it," she says. "Good for winter."

But today it hasn't quite worked out to plan.

The matriarch of the Corby clan, a mother with one daughter in prison 4000km away and another locked in a vicious courtroom battle trying to clear the family name, has just burned her latest batch.

She's been too busy yapping on the phone in her Queensland home and being distracted by news from Sydney.

"Now look what you've made me do," Rosleigh tells her caller.

What should have been sweet and hot has turned bitter. It's a taste the Corbys have grown accustomed to in recent years, ever since they were catapulted from suburban obscurity into the harsh, unrelenting public scrutiny that accompanied her daughter Schapelle's arrest in Bali.

Rosleigh shrugs and declares she will simply have to start again. If only it was always that easy.

Imagine it, Rosleigh. Imagine you had the chance to scrub the pot clean and wipe away the last four years.

No boogie board bag weighed down with a 4kg stash of marijuana. No Schapelle wasting the best years of her life in a rank Indonesian jail.

No packs of TV hounds raking through your lives.

And no trying to make jam with the grandkids at your feet while daughter Mercedes sits in the Supreme Court in Sydney, listening to her dyed-blonde former best friend tell the world that your family are drug runners.

J ODIE Power brushes a strand of lank hair from her face. The fairness accentuates a deep tan. The constant clenching of her jaw exaggerates her high cheekbones.

This is room 11E of the Supreme Court.

It's white, small, and the airconditioning whispers so quietly you can hear the growling and small moans from stomachs in the public seats.

But despite, or more likely because of, a succession of sometimes tawdry, sensational claims, appetites for this saga have been far from whetted.

Power, rake thin in a dark jacket, stares at the man in the wig who has spent days accusing her of being a liar.

Stuart Littlemore, QC, pursued a relentless campaign against tabloid current affairs programs during his stint years ago as host of the ABC's Media Watch program.

Littlemore's questioning of Power, the key witness in Mercedes Corby's defamation action against the Seven network's Today Tonight program, has been aggressive and already earned him a rebuke from the judge for bullying.

At one point in his cross-examination, he asked Power, who has admitted to a lengthy history of drug use, about the presence of cocaine at a party.

"If there was cocaine there, you would have sucked it up like an industrial-strength vacuum cleaner, wouldn't you?" Littlemore asked.

Power: "No."

Last year she was paid $100,000 by Seven to air claims on Today Tonight that Mercedes was a regular drug user, had smuggled drugs and that the Corby family had a long history of drug use.

Littlemore has told the court Power was motivated by "money, hatred and celebrity" to go public, is a liar and that "there is really nothing that Channel 7 will stop at in lying to its audience".

Littlemore's opponent and counsel for Seven, Tom Hughes, QC, has told the jury Mercedes was a frequent drug user who was "involved in this vile trade", and that there was evidence she had sold drugs in Japan and Indonesia.

It has already been a case filled with all the staples of television drama.

The Miracle Diet! (the drug speed -- your path to rapid weight loss). Sex! (all-day sessions fuelled by methamphetamines). Busted! (marijuana hidden in vaginas).

But it has also become a tale of broken friendships and busted dreams.

And while the case may be centred around Mercedes and her bid to clear her name, it has also exposed the fierce rivalry for ratings between Nine's A Current Affair and its Channel 7 opponent.

For the past four years the Corby saga has been the main battleground for the war between the two shows.

Soon after Schapelle's arrest in Bali, Nine signed Rosleigh, providing flights and accommodation in Bali for her to regularly visit her daughter.

ACA's ownership of the Corby side of the story gave it a big advantage in the prized fight for 6.30pm supremacy.

But Power's allegations last year rewarded Today Tonight with a sizeable victory at the start of a new ratings year.

Her claims also seemed to swing public opinion against Schapelle, with several online polls showing those polled had changed their minds about her innocence.

Littlemore has told the court he had a letter from Seven to Power detailing "what answers to give, otherwise she wouldn't get the money".

Power took a lie detector test on the program and failed, breaking down on air.

Littlemore told the court Power's televised tears were not over the breakdown of her long-running friendship with Mercedes, but over the fact she had failed a lie detector test set up to prove her claims.

"What she does is break down at the enormity of the lies she is telling. She'd just done her dough. She knew: No show, no dough," he said.

Power passed another polygraph test and was duly paid.

She has told the court she had asked for the cheque to be sent to a private post office box and needed the money to help meet legal costs for a bitter marital breakup.

Power sits in the gallery, her time in the witness box over, watching Littlemore cross-examine her mother, Margaret Campbell.

She brushes aside another strand of hair, and then wipes tears before standing and walking out of the court.

A week earlier, Mercedes had also sobbed and left the room after breaking down when Littlemore briefly mentioned her father, who died recently.

Margaret Campbell has been telling the jury how angry she had been with Mercedes for allegedly tricking her into transporting a brick-sized package of marijuana from the Gold Coast to her daughter, who was then in Byron Bay.

Campbell said her fury led to her telling Power she was a "f---ing bitch".

She said she had telephoned Mercedes and told her: "Never do anything like that again or I will cut your balls out and hand them to you on a silver platter."

Campbell agrees she has seen her daughter smoke drugs in front of her children.

But it is only when she details Power's marriage problems, including allegations of beatings and other abuse, that Power gets up and leaves.

Littlemore asks Campbell why, after defending her daughter on Today Tonight and backing her claims about the Corbys, she rang A Current Affair two days later and said the Corbys were a nice family.

Campbell becomes animated and says she wanted everyone's lives to return to normal.

But now there is no returning to normal. They are all in the same jam and no one, it seems, will avoid being burned.

Power and Mercedes Corby met on the Gold Coast in 1992.

Power told the court they smoked marijuana, which they usually bought from Mercedes' brother, Michael.

Two years later they went to Japan, where Power says Mercedes introduced her to speed and "shabu" -- another term for methamphetamine or ice.

Power has told the court Mercedes showed her how to smoke shabu: "It was an inverted bit of foil. You smoke it through a straw. It was unusual so I asked, 'What is it'?"

But it was not until a holiday in Bali four years later with then-boyfriend Steve Power claimed Mercedes persuaded her to try shabu.

"She told me it was shabu and that it's pretty good and you can f--- all day."

Asked about the drug's effects, Power said: "Steve and I had sex all day."

Hughes, in his opening address, said Mercedes had introduced Power to these drugs, and he had evidence to show she sold shabu in Japan and Indonesia, and speed and pot in Australia, in league with her brother, Michael.

As part of the legal action, Mercedes is also suing Today Tonight host Anna Coren and producer Bryan Seymour.

Littlemore has told the hearing Coren had made a "shamelessly false assertion" that Power had received death threats after making her claims, when in fact she was on an all-expenses paid holiday in Canada, courtesy of Seven.

The Seven network is pleading truth and contextual truth as its defence. There is at least another week left of allegations and cross-examinations.

And then the four-person jury will be left to decide.

Meanwhile, Rosleigh Rose will remain in Queensland, listening for the phone and waiting for winter to arrive.

Maybe it already has.