In a High Court ruling today, the judge said that the injunction, intended to ban any reporting of the alleged affair between glamour model Thomas and Ryan Giggs, might be lifted as there was no longer “any point in maintaining the anonymity”.
The hearing was requested by Imogen Thomas who told the court how stressful it had been having to defend herself from Giggs’ accusation that she tried to blackmail him.
One of the arguments Giggs used to win the injunction against Thomas and NGN, publisher of The Sun, was that she was trying to blackmail him.
Thomas’ lawyers, and saw David Price QC read a statement in the case of CTB (Giggs’ pseudonym) vs News Group Newspapers and Ms Thomas.
Price revealed the blackmail claim arose out of an article in The Sun on April 14, which named Thomas but did not name CTB. Worried that more details would emerge, CTB sought an injunction later that day.
“In his witness statement supporting the application CTB stated that Ms Thomas’ conduct had led him to suspect that she was thinking of selling her story to the press,” Price said.
“He also said that she had asked him for money to assist in the purchase of a flat and that he had become suspicious about her motivation.
“He was also concerned that she had retained the well known publicist Max Clifford to represent her.”
Price told the court that after the injunction had been imposed, papers widely reported that Thomas had been trying to blackmail CBT, despite there being no hard evidence of the fact.
Thomas said in a statement: “To suddenly have to defend my character because of this legal process has been extremely upsetting and stressful.
“I’m just relieved that the parties and the court now accept that I’m no blackmailer. I have been vindicated and that’s all I wanted.”
According to Price’s lawyer, Giggs and Thomas have come to an agreement about what really happened.
“The Sun has now made it clear that Ms Thomas was not responsible for the article of April 14,” Price said.
“CTB accepts this and also accepts that Ms Thomas did not wish any private information to be published. She had, in fact, retained Max Clifford to try to prevent a story from coming out.
“Ms Thomas, in turn, accepts that the decision to publish her name was taken by The Sun, and that CTB did not want that to happen.”
