NURZAILA BINTI AHMAD SUFFIAN v SUHANI BINTI MD NASIR

Case Significance

Illustrates the grant of protective interim injunctive relief under Order 29 rule 1 of the Rules of Court 2012 against a persistent course of harassment and threatened dissemination of intimate images, the court applying the three-limb test and restraining the defendant from harassing or defaming the plaintiff pending trial.

This High Court decision concerns an application for an interim injunction under Order 29 rule 1 of the Rules of Court 2012 to restrain a course of harassment, intimidation and defamation pending the trial of the plaintiff's claim. The plaintiff and the defendant were connected through the plaintiff's husband, who was the defendant's former spouse. The plaintiff alleged that over a period of years the defendant had engaged in a persistent and oppressive course of conduct against her, including shouting insults in public, sending messages threatening to disseminate intimate images of the plaintiff and to defame her, and making derogatory social-media postings referring to the plaintiff by name; she said this conduct had caused humiliation, emotional trauma and a diagnosed psychiatric injury, and she supported the application with a police report and a medical report. The defendant denied the allegations and asserted that the claim was malicious and intended to alienate her children from their father. Applying the established three-limb test for interlocutory injunctions, the court found that the messages, social-media screenshots and police report showed, on their face, a continuing course of conduct that, if proven, could found causes of action including the tort of harassment and defamation, so there was a serious question to be tried; that damages would not be an adequate remedy for the kind of harm alleged; and that the balance of convenience favoured protective relief. The court held that the defendant's cross-allegation that the plaintiff had defamed her to her employer, even if true, was a matter for separate proceedings and did not defeat the plaintiff's entitlement to protection. It accordingly allowed the application in part, restraining the defendant from harassing, threatening or intimidating the plaintiff and from publishing statements or images defaming or humiliating her on social media, while preserving lawful communication about the defendant's children, and recorded the plaintiff's undertaking as to damages, with costs in the cause. The judgment illustrates the grant of protective injunctive relief against harassment and threatened dissemination of intimate images.