Defamation of Character Lawyers in Melbourne

When the attack is on you, not your business

Thief. Fraud. Abuser. Someone who is unsafe around children. When a false accusation like that reaches your workplace, your family or your community, the damage is personal and it compounds every day it sits there unanswered. The law calls this defamation, you may know it as defamation of character, and it gives you a way to force a retraction and be compensated for the harm.

You have 12 months from publication to act, and the mandatory first step takes weeks rather than days. If the accusation is out there now, call MK Law on 1800 130 120 today. The first call is free.

What “defamation of character” means in Victorian law

There is no separate tort called defamation of character; it is a defamation claim brought by an individual, and individuals get the law’s strongest protection. You do not have to prove you lost money. Serious harm to reputation can be shown through lost work, a damaged professional standing, or relationships the accusation destroyed. The full four-part test is on our what is defamation page; on the phone we apply it to your facts in minutes.

The attacks we act on most

The same handful of patterns keep turning up. A false accusation of theft or fraud gets circulated through an industry, or a workplace complaint is copied to people who had no business receiving it. A rumour runs through a school community, a sporting club or a church. An ex-partner works a campaign through mutual friends and whatever sits adjacent to the family court proceedings. Or a one-star review names you personally and accuses you of dishonesty instead of criticising the service. Almost all of it travels online before it travels anywhere else, so the takedown routes set out for social media defamation usually matter as much as the claim itself.

Each of these calls for a different opening move, anywhere from a quiet lawyer’s letter to a formal concerns notice with a 28-day clock attached. Part of what you get from the free call is knowing which one fits your situation, because the wrong opening move, usually a furious public reply, hands the other side ammunition. If the person who said it turns out to have a defence worth worrying about, our defamation lawyers will say so before you spend anything on a claim that cannot land.

What you can get back

A properly drafted concerns notice forces the publisher to choose within 28 days: take it down, apologise, pay, or defend a claim. Most choose not to defend. If the matter proceeds, a court can award damages for non-economic loss up to the $520,000 cap, add aggravated damages for malice, order an injunction against repetition, and make the publisher contribute to your costs. Just as importantly for most clients, a retraction in front of the same audience corrects the record. Where the accusation also cost you the job, the money for that sits in a separate wrongful termination claim, and the two can be run side by side.

Spoken accusations count too

If the attack was said aloud at a meeting, over a fence or in a phone call others heard, it is still actionable. Victoria abolished the old split between spoken and written defamation, which we explain on our slander vs libel page. What matters is witnesses: note down who heard it, when and where, while memories are fresh.

Talk to a defamation of character lawyer today

Call 1800 130 120 or use the form on this page. Evenings and weekends included, because these calls rarely wait for business hours.