Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo has commenced legal proceedings against social media personality Byron Mackintosh popularly known as “Bryan Max” for libel after the latter had claimed in a Facebook post that he had tampered with his car’s brakes to cause his death.
In his claim, Jagdeo (the claimant) is requesting general damages over $5 million from Mackintosh (the defendant) in addition to exemplary and aggravating damages for libel.
Filed on Thursday at the High Court in Georgetown, Jagdeo’s lawsuit concerns a live audio/video broadcast that took place on November 9, on Mackintosh’s 30,000-follower Facebook page.
Jagdeo, who is the General Secretary of the PPP/C, claims that during the broadcast, Mackintosh accused him of being involved in a plot to kill him.
“The words in their natural and ordinary meaning meant and were understood to mean that the claimant was directly involved in the apparent sabotage of the defendant’s vehicle, to wit, the cutting of his brakes line with the objective of causing the death of the defendant,” Jagdeo’s lawyers, Sanjeev Datadin and Khalif Gobin said in a Statement of Claim.
Byron Mackintosh
According to Jagdeo’s attorneys, he is a well-known public personality who has received praise from all around the world. The publications that have been complained of have hurt their client’s reputation and caused him a great deal of anguish and shame, the lawyers said.
Datadin and Gobin stated that Mackintosh would carry on repeating the false and defamatory remarks regarding the Vice President unless restrained.
In light of this, they are requesting that the High Court issue an order barring the defendant, his employees, agents, and other representatives from posting or causing to be published the aforementioned or other phrases that defame the claimant in the future.
The former President is also requesting, “An order directing the defendant to forthwith remove all social media posts which contain the false and defamatory words or similar words which convey either expressly or infer the same meaning, from his Facebook page.”
He is further requesting costs, interest, an order in language that will be approved by the court telling Mackintosh to withdraw and apologise to him for making false and defamatory statements, and any other orders the court may deem appropriate.
In July, Jagdeo filed a $50 million libel lawsuit against Su Zhi Rong, aka “Su Zhirong”, the Chinese businessman who accused him of bribery and corruption in the VICE News exposé.
