World motorsport chief Max Mosley won his privacy case in London’s High Court on Thursday against a British newspaper that alleged he took part in a Nazi-themed sadomasochistic orgy with prostitutes.
Mosley, president of the FIA (Federation Internationale de l’Automobile) and son of 1930s British fascist leader Sir Oswald Mosley, was awarded £60 000 in damages against News Group Newspapers, owners of the News of the World tabloid that ran the story.
He had admitted paying five women for sex in March but denied there was a Nazi theme, saying the session in March centred on a prison fantasy and accusing the top-selling Sunday tabloid of a gross invasion of privacy.
”I can think of few things more unerotic than Nazi role play,” Mosley told the court. ”All my life, I have had hanging over me my antecedents, my parents, and the last thing I want to do in some sexual context is be reminded of it.”
Mosley fought off attempts to have him removed as the FIA head in the wake of the story.
Mosley’s lawyer, James Price, had told the court that the News of the World‘s ”gross and indefensible intrusion” was made worse by the false suggestion that Mosley played a concentration camp commandant and death-camp inmate in the session.
Colin Myler, the paper’s editor, had insisted that the session, which it filmed and put on the internet, had a legitimate public-interest angle, adding it was ”absolutely not true” that the Nazi aspect was false.
During the five-hour S&M session, Mosley (68) was chained up and subjected to a medical examination, including a check for lice.
One of the women caned Mosley 21 times, drawing blood and necessitating a plaster on his bottom.
Later, Mosley punished three of the women — all of whom were dressed in stripy uniforms — with a strap while speaking German to another woman who was playing the role of prison guard.
Afterwards, the women and Mosley relaxed with a drink in the flat in plush Chelsea, south-west London, where the session took place, before going their separate ways.
Mosley has admitted paying the women £500 each for the session and renting the basement flat where it took place.
He told the court he spoke in German because the language sounded harsh and suited the role he was playing.
Myler accepted that the newspaper — part of media tycoon Rupert Murdoch’s global business empire — had not sought a transcript of the German conversations before publishing the story.
The newspaper also faced a setback during the case when a star witness — a woman who secretly filmed the session — could not give evidence in court due to what its lawyer, Mark Warby, said was ”her emotional and mental state”. — AFP
