Defamatory sex slur by Mick Molloy was just a passing comment

A JUDGE who ruled that comedian Mick Molloy had defamed Nicole Cornes in a sex slur interpreted the comment in a way an ordinary person would not, an Adelaide court has heard.

Ms Cornes, a former ALP candidate who is married to former Adelaide Crows AFL coach Graham Cornes, won $93,000 in damages last year when the South Australian Supreme Court found she was defamed by insinuations she had slept with a former AFL player.

Molloy made the comment on Network Ten's Before the Game football show in 2008.

Lawyers for Ten are appealing the judgment, with Dick Whitington, QC, arguing today that the trial judge erred in intellectualising a passing comment.

Ms Cornes was present at the appeal hearing before the full bench of the Supreme Court, who saw a video of the show.

"A viewer sees a transitory broadcast, they don't get to go back over it. They don't get to intellectualise it,'' Mr Whitington said.

Mr Whitington said Mr Molloy's comment was not meant to be taken literally but within the show's humorous context.

"The words were only defamatory by way of innuendo,'' Mr Whitington said.

He said the ordinary person would not approach the matter the way a lawyer would, and if there was a "factual sting'' in Molloy's statement, it would not have been humorous.

The hearing continues.
 

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