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QB VII by Leon Uris is a dramatic courtroom novel published in 1970. The four-part novel highlights the events leading to a libel trial in the United Kingdom. The novel was Uris's second consecutive #1 New York Times Best Seller and third overall. The novel is loosely based on a court case for defamation ( Dering v Uris ) that arose from Uris's earlier best-selling novel Exodus .
"QB VII" is an abbreviation of Queen's Bench Courtroom Number Seven.
A famous author, Abraham Cady, stands trial for libel. In his book The Holocaust, he named eminent surgeon Sir Adam Kelno as one of the Jadwiga concentration camp's most sadistic inmate/doctors. Cady wrote the book after discovering the Jadwiga concentration camp was the site of his family's extermination.
Kelno has denied his involvement in sadistic practices, and asserts he worked hard to save prisoners, at great personal risk. Furious at his depiction by Cady, Kelno brings libel charges against him.
In the end, Kelno wins his case but is awarded one half-penny, the smallest coin of the realm, because his past actions were found to have been so bad that the minor inaccuracies in the book could not have damaged his reputation further.
The book was loosely based on a libel case involving the author and brought by Polish doctor Wladislaw Derig. Derig alleged that Uris had defamed him in his book Exodus.
The book was adapted into an Emmy-winning American television miniseries QB VII which aired on ABC on April 29 and 30, 1974.
Defamation is a communication that injures a third party's reputation and causes a legally redressable injury. The precise legal definition of defamation varies from country to country. It is not necessarily restricted to making assertions that are falsifiable, and can extend to concepts that are more abstract than reputation – like dignity and honour. In the English-speaking world, the law of defamation traditionally distinguishes between libel and slander. It is treated as a civil wrong, as a criminal offence, or both.
McDonald's Corporation v Steel & Morris[1997] EWHC 366 (QB), known as "the McLibel case", was an English lawsuit for libel filed by McDonald's Corporation against environmental activists Helen Steel and David Morris over a factsheet critical of the company. Each of two hearings in English courts found some of the leaflet's contested claims to be libellous and others to be true.
Leon Marcus Uris was an American author of historical fiction who wrote many bestselling books including Exodus and Trinity.
Mila 18 is a historical novel by Leon Uris set in German-occupied Warsaw, Poland, before and during World War II. Mila 18 debuted at #7 on The New York Times Best Seller list and peaked at #2 in August 1961. Leon Uris's work, based on real events, covers the Nazi occupation of Poland and the atrocities of systematically dehumanising and eliminating the Jewish people of Poland. The name "Mila 18" is taken from the headquarters bunker of Jewish resistance fighters underneath the building at ulica Miła 18. The term ghetto takes on a clearer meaning as the courageous Jewish leaders fight a losing battle against not only the Nazis and their henchmen, but also profiteers and collaborators among themselves. Eventually, as the ghetto is reduced to rubble, a few courageous individuals with few weapons and no outside help assume command of ghetto defence, form a makeshift army and make a stand.
Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323 (1974), was a landmark decision of the US Supreme Court establishing the standard of First Amendment protection against defamation claims brought by private individuals. The Court held that, so long as they do not impose liability without fault, states are free to establish their own standards of liability for defamatory statements made about private individuals. However, the Court also ruled that if the state standard is lower than actual malice, the standard applying to public figures, then only actual damages may be awarded.
Exodus is a historical novel by American novelist Leon Uris about the founding of the State of Israel beginning with a compressed retelling of the voyages of the 1947 immigration ship Exodus and describing the histories of the various main characters and the ties of their personal lives to the birth of the new Jewish state.
Exodus is a 1960 American epic historical drama film about the founding of the State of Israel. Produced and directed by Otto Preminger, the screenplay was adapted by Dalton Trumbo from the 1958 novel of the same name by Leon Uris. The film stars an ensemble cast including Paul Newman, Eva Marie Saint, Ralph Richardson, Peter Lawford, Lee J. Cobb, Sal Mineo, John Derek and George Maharis. The film's soundtrack music was written by Ernest Gold.
Sir David Cozens-Hardy Hirst was an English barrister and judge who served as a Lord Justice of Appeal from 1992 to 1999. The Times described him as "one of the leading advocates of his generation".
Libel tourism is a term, first coined by Geoffrey Robertson, to describe forum shopping for libel suits. It particularly refers to the practice of pursuing a case in England and Wales, in preference to other jurisdictions, such as the United States, which provide more extensive defenses for those accused of making derogatory statements.
The Ardlamont Murder, which took place in Argyll, Scotland, on 10 August 1893, gave rise to two high-profile court cases: a murder trial in Edinburgh, and a defamation trial in London the following year.
Sir David Eady is a retired High Court judge in England and Wales. As a judge, he is known for having presided over many high-profile libel and privacy cases.
Trial films is a subgenre of the legal/courtroom drama that encompasses films that are centered on a civil or criminal trial, typically a trial by jury.
Modern libel and slander laws in many countries are originally descended from English defamation law. The history of defamation law in England is somewhat obscure; civil actions for damages seem to have been relatively frequent as far back as the Statute of Gloucester in the reign of Edward I (1272–1307). The law of libel emerged during the reign of James I (1603–1625) under Attorney General Edward Coke who started a series of libel prosecutions. Scholars frequently attribute strict English defamation law to James I's outlawing of duelling. From that time, both the criminal and civil remedies have been found in full operation.
David Irving v Penguin Books and Deborah Lipstadt is a case in English law against American historian Deborah Lipstadt and her British publisher Penguin Books, filed in the High Court of Justice by the British author David Irving in 1996, asserting that Lipstadt had libelled him in her 1993 book Denying the Holocaust. The court ruled that Irving's claim of libel relating to Holocaust denial was not valid under English defamation law because Lipstadt's claim that he had deliberately distorted evidence had been shown to be substantially true. English libel law puts the burden of proof on the defence, meaning that it was up to Lipstadt and her publisher to prove that her claims of Irving's deliberate misrepresentation of evidence to conform to his ideological viewpoints were substantially true.
The Libel Act 1843, commonly known as Lord Campbell's Libel Act, was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It enacted several important codifications of and modifications to the common law tort of libel.
Dering v Uris and Others was a 1964 English libel suit brought by Polish-born Wladislaw Dering against the American writer Leon Uris. It was described at the time as the first war crimes trial held in Britain.
Time, Inc. v. Hill, 385 U.S. 374 (1967), is a United States Supreme Court case involving issues of privacy in balance with the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and principles of freedom of speech. The Court held 6–3 that the latter requires that merely negligent intrusions into the former by the media not be civilly actionable. It expanded that principle from its landmark defamation holding in New York Times v. Sullivan.
Michael Bernard Rubinstein was a solicitor who specialised in representing authors and publisher. He acted for Penguin Books in the obscenity trial in 1960, R v Penguin Books Ltd., following publication of an uncensored edition of D.H. Lawrence's novel Lady Chatterley's Lover.
QB VII is an American television miniseries produced by Screen Gems; it was also the final program from Columbia Pictures's television division to be made under the Screen Gems banner. It began airing on ABC on April 29, 1974. Adapted to the screen by Edward Anhalt from the 1970 novel QB VII by Leon Uris, it was produced by Douglas S. Cramer and directed by Tom Gries. The original music was written by Jerry Goldsmith and the cinematography by Paul Beeson and Robert L. Morrison.
The Maharaj Libel Case was an 1862 trial in the Bombay Court in British India. The case was against Nanabhai Rustomji Ranina and Karsandas Mulji, they alleged that & their public accusation is that the religious leaders of Pushtimarg had had sexual liaisons with women devotees, & it was libelous for petitioner.