David Walliams has lost his injunction bid after the High Court ruled that news organisations could name him in relation to allegations against him. The comedian and author, 55, had sought to stop publication by and ITN.
At the full trial last month, his lawyers argued that publication would threaten his life. Walliams told the court he was "not a sexual predator" and had not "broken the law".
Mr Justice Nicklin
Mr Justice Nicklin said and ITN had no sound legal reason to be stopped from publishing their investigation. He said the case did not give Walliams a basis for a permanent injunction, and that the court's role was to decide the legal dispute between him and the news organisations.
The judge said Walliams had been detained for his own protection, and that the responsibility to try to protect his life was on clinicians and the hospital he had already been taken to. The court said it could not provide that protection because it had not taken responsibility for his psychiatric treatment or safety.
Article 2 and the High Court
The judgment also dealt with Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which concerns the state's duty to protect life. Mr Justice Nicklin said he had to take into account the media's right to freedom of speech to publish what was described in court as a detailed investigation in the public interest.
Walliams's lawyers did not argue that the investigation would reveal legally confidential or private information the journalists were not entitled to publish. The judge said there had been no evidence to detail a right to private family life issue in the case.
Walliams and the allegations
The ruling means Walliams cannot keep his name out of the published investigation through this injunction route. The court said he could later sue for defamation if the media's claims are wrong, leaving that as the remedy if he challenges the allegations after publication. The application had been an open secret from the start after an anonymised filing briefly appeared under his own name on a court cases register.
