A supporter who spat at Jarryd Hayne’s rape victim will be awarded nominal damages for defamation, with a judge ruling he was guilty of ‘general disgraceful conduct’ after the former star was banned from the league.
Mina Greiss was among a group who attended Newcastle’s courthouse in May 2021 when Hayne was sentenced to five years and nine months in prison after being found guilty of two charges of sexual assault without consent.
Hayne’s victim left the court surrounded by sheriffs and prosecutors as the group pushed their way past waiting reporters and Mr. Greiss and his friends.
Seven Network journalist Leonie Ryan took a photo of Mr Greiss and posted it to her Twitter feed, accusing him of “staring the victim down” and spitting in the woman’s direction.
Mina Greiss (pictured) successfully sued Channel 7 after the channel published a story claiming he stared and spat at Jarryd Hayne’s rape victim
Mr Greiss denied spitting at Hayne’s rape victim.
He sued Seven for defamation over a news article published on the company’s website and Facebook page, as well as Ryan’s tweet.
Federal Court Judge Anna Katzmann found that Seven had falsely reported that Mr Greiss had ‘stared’ at the woman and spat at her.
Instead, the judge found he had spat in a garden bed towards the victim and stared at her as she walked past.
However, Seven was successful in mounting a contextual truth defense for the news article and Ryan’s tweet, with the judge ruling that the publication contained true statements that Mr Greiss had engaged in other outrageous behavior outside the courthouse.
Mr. Greiss stared at the victim, spat in her direction and urged waiting journalists to describe her as an “escort” in their articles, Judge Katzmann said.
“Ordinary, decent people would view any expression of contempt for a sexual assault victim as shameful, especially when, as in the case of the first case, they were told that the sexual assault was ‘brutal,’” she wrote.
Channel Seven (stock image) published a story that was also posted on social media accusing Mr Greiss of ‘staring the victim down’
The defamatory statements he spat at the victim did not damage his reputation, the judge ruled.
Seven failed in their defense that their news article or Facebook post was merely honest opinion.
However, it managed to show that Ryan’s tweet was her own opinion.
Since Mr. Greiss could only prove that the network’s Facebook post was defamatory, Judge Katzmann awarded him “nominal damages.”
The Hayne fan had shown “open hostility” towards the rape victim as she left the courthouse and engaged in “general disgraceful behaviour” in front of journalists and television cameras on the public street, she wrote.
She awarded damages of $35,000 plus interest for Mr Greiss’s feelings of shame, anger, embarrassment and fear over the Facebook post.
Hayne raped the woman at her home near Newcastle on the night of the 2018 NRL Grand Final.
He was in town for the weekend and paid a taxi driver $550 to wait outside the house, which the woman shared with her mother, before being driven to Sydney.
Former footy star Jarryd Hayne (pictured left) was found guilty of raping the victim during the 2018 NRL grand final
His first trial was abandoned in 2020 due to a hung jury, before he was convicted in Newcastle in May 2021.
This conviction was overturned on appeal and the case went back to a third trial in 2023, where the ex-footballer was convicted again.
In May, Hayne was sentenced to four years and nine months in prison with a non-parole period of three years.
He has since appealed this decision again, but a hearing has yet to be scheduled.
