TV presenter Gabby Logan and her husband are set to receive a “significant” payout after Mail Online mistakenly reported that they had been paid to promote a tax avoidance scheme to celebrity friends.
Logan and her partner, Kenny, a former rugby player, had threatened to sue the Mail’s publisher, Associated Newspapers, after the story emerged in February.
The company later retracted the story.
The couple is also receiving compensation from an accountant quoted in the story and former Sun editor Kelvin Mackenzie.
Jonathan Coad, the Logans’ lawyer, told the Press Association that the total amount “reaches a six-figure sum.”
The original story claimed the couple had received a £500,000 commission for promoting a tax avoidance scheme.
Gwilym Jones, the director of a litigation investment company, was quoted as alleging that the couple had attempted to disguise the commission as a loan to avoid tax on it.
“Such accusations are entirely untrue, as now acknowledged by Mail Online,” stated the documents filed in the High Court on Friday.
Legal documents also claimed that Jones’s claims had caused “serious damage and distress” to Gabby and Kenny Logan.
Jones “repeatedly refused to withdraw false and highly damaging allegations,” but eventually “accepted” a settlement offer and paid compensation after the Logan family initiated legal action, according to the filing.
Following the publication of the story, Mackenzie posted a tweet describing the alleged behavior of the couple as “shocking.” He has since deleted the tweet and paid compensation as well.
Court documents stated, “Although Kenny acted as a brand ambassador for a company selling financial products, including tax avoidance schemes, and received commissions for introductions, neither Gabby nor Kenny Logan ever promoted a tax avoidance scheme, either to their celebrity friends or anyone else, for that matter. Even fewer claimed they did so. They also did not receive a £500,000 commission for alleged activities.”
This case arises nine years after Gabby Logan admitted to being part of a tax avoidance scheme but claimed she had invested in it in “good faith” and believed it was a “way to fund new ventures in the music industry,” promising to repay any owed taxes.
