The dismissal of a two-pronged £250,000 claim for libel damages as an abuse of process does not negate the need for a new law against abusive litigation, campaigners have argued.
In the litigation, businessman Claudio Di Giovanni brought proceedings in person over an August 2025 article in The Londoner newspaper headed 'Claudio is scamming'. Three weeks after the article's appearance he obtained a default judgment for £10,250 in the county court against freelance jorunalist Cormac Kehoe. A second claim, seeking damages of £250,000 against Kehoe, the Londoner's editor and publishing company was issed in the High Court two months later.
Following a hearing last month in De Giovanni v Kehoe & Ors Mrs Justice Steyn, joint head of the Media and Communications List, last week struck out the county court judgment as an abuse of process and granted an order setting aside the High Court claim.
In her judgment, she found that the Di Giovanni (who also styles himself De Giovanni) had served the county court claim form at an address where Kehoe had not lived for two years. The claim was brought 'in the wrong court without first complying with the pre-action protocol.'
Overall, she said Di Giovanni had brought parallel defamation claims... in respect of the same publication. 'That is an abuse of process.'
However the judge declined to dismiss the High Court claim under civil procedure rule 7 for Di Giovanni's failure to respond to correspondence. While Di Giovanni gave 'unsatisfactory' explanations for a five-month period of non-communication 'it seems to me that he does intend to pursue this claim'.
Rather the judge granted the defendants' application for a declaration that the court had no jurisdiction on the ground that the claimant had failed to serve the claim form.
Founder and editor of The Londoner, Joshi Herrmann, said his legal team had written to Di Giovanni informing him that the defendants will pursue a costs order to recover almost £40,000 in legal fees.
The Di Giovanni claims - which according to The Londoner included ungrounded threats of criminal proceedings and imprisonment - have been cited as a case study by campaigners for a new 'SLAPP' law. Nik Williams, co-chair of the UK Anti-SLAPP Coalition, said: ’The Londoner has prevailed in this instance, but that does not take away from the fact that current legal protections are wholly insufficient, as most cases cannot meet the high threshold required for dismissal. A universal anti-SLAPP law would directly address this problem.’
Claire Overman, instructed by Lewis Silkin LLP, appeared for the defendants; Di Giovanni appeared in person.
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