NewLeaf launches defamation suit over social media posts

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This article was published 28/07/2016 (3550 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Social media posts have hurt business for a Winnipeg-based low-cost air travel service, the company says in a defamation lawsuit against one of its detractors.

NewLeaf Travel is suing airline-passenger advocate and former U of M assistant professor Gabor Lukacs over Twitter and Facebook posts it argues were designed to harm the company’s reputation and discourage potential customers.

The lawsuit, filed in court earlier this month, takes issue with several tweets posted on Lukacs’ Air Passenger Rights Twitter account in late June, most using the hashtag #Dont#GoNewLeaf – a take-down of the company’s promotional slogan.

The tweets singled out in the lawsuit, which haven’t been deleted from the Twitter account, say NewLeaf has unpaid bills and is operating illegally without a licence – statements NewLeaf alleges are false and malicious.

“NewLeaf does not pay its bills. Do not risk your money. #Winnipeg #Dont#GoNewLeaf,” reads one of the tweets.

The company is seeking damages and a permanent injunction to stop Lukacs from using social media to further what it calls “an unrelenting, aggressive and malicious attack targeted at NewLeaf and at NewLeaf’s potential and existing customers.”

NewLeaf, a service that sells airline tickets through a partnership with Kelowna, B.C.-based Flair Air, began offering its first flights out of Winnipeg earlier this week after a delayed launch due to licensing confusion. The company began selling tickets to customers in January, but decided to refund those tickets out of an “abundance of caution” while awaiting a ruling from the Canadian Transportation Agency on whether the company, as a reseller of air travel and not an air carrier, would need a licence under the CTA, the statement of claim states. The CTA determined NewLeaf didn’t need a licence.

But the company alleges Lukacs has “persistently and relentlessly pursued his intention of halting NewLeaf’s operations, which has caused, and will continue to cause damage to NewLeaf’s credit, goodwill and reputation, as well as financial loss,” the suit says, arguing that because Lukacs “has held himself out as an air passenger rights advocate,” he has a duty not to make misleading public statements about NewLeaf.

Contacted by the Free Press Thursday, Lukacs said he had no knowledge of the lawsuit against him and had yet to be served. He declined to comment on the allegations. The defamation suit against him was filed in court July 15. On July 21, Lukacs filed an injunction against NewLeaf to the Federal Court of Appeal alleging the company was financially unstable. The motion asked the court to shut down NewLeaf unless the company could post a $3.74 million performance bond “for the claims of stranded passengers,” in the event NewLeaf folds, The Financial Post reported.

The lawsuit has not been proven and no statement of defence has been filed.