Salman Rushdie receives apology in libel trial

On Tuesday, London’s High Court issued a declaration of falsehood in Salman Rushdie’s libel case against former bodyguard Ronald Evans. The defendant was required to apologize on 11 counts of falsehood.

Sir Rushdie, Best-of-the-Booker Prize winner and Knight Bachelor for “Services to Literature,” sued Evans for slander after the ex-cop’s tell-all memoir accused him of everything from profiteering to bad hygiene.

Rushdie’s alliance with Evans began after the 1988 publication of his fourth book, The Satanic Verses. The novel was acclaimed critically but received a violent repudiation in the Muslim community, leading to the infamous fatwa: five months after the book’s release, Iran’s Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a fiat calling for Rushdie’s execution. A bounty reinforcing this edict forced the author into police protection, where he was placed in Ron Evans’ charge.

The now-falsified allegations in Evans’ autobiography included Rushdie’s poor treatment of his police protection team and the assertion that his most recent marriage had been based on wealth.

When the judge implicated both ghostwriter Douglas Thompson and John Blake Publishing, the latter voluntarily destroyed the first 4,000 copies of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. The memoir will be published once the Rushdie-related chapters have been corrected.

Rushdie’s suit demanded only an apology and recompense for his legal fees. He declined to sue for damages, hoping that this case would serve as a precedent for other English libel trials, which are too often abused due to plaintiff-friendly libel laws. “My only interest was to establish the truth,” he told the Associated Press after the ruling.
 
Related links:
Rushdie News from The Associated Press
The Satanic Verses on Google Books
New York Times Special Feature on Salman Rushdie

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