The Green MSP and land reform campaigner Andy Wightman will soon be launching a crowd funding appeal to help pay for his legal costs as he is sued for more than £750,000 over blogs he wrote.
Mr Wightman has revealed the action by Wildcat Haven Enterprises CIC is proceeding and that he has been served with a summons from legal agents acting for them. His blogs, which he wrote before he was elected as a Green MSP in 2016, are claimed to be “grossly defamatory” of the solicitors' clients.
He said he was "...to appear in the Court of Session seeking interdict on a charge of defamation and claiming £750,000 damages (plus 8% interest from date of citation). In light of the fact that defending this action will be very expensive, I will be launching a crowd-funder shortly to seek assistance with meeting the likely costs. I will be meeting with my legal advisers as soon as I can and will be making no further comment until then."
Mr Wightman, author of the acclaimed "The Poor Had No Lawyers", has already said that he would not be able to pay the damages sought, so losing the action could mean his bankruptcy and disqualification as an MSP.
Wildcat Haven is a project designed to protect the Scottish Wildcat by preventing hybridisation with feral cats and providing a network of reserves to manage as wildcat habitat. But Mr Wightman has written about its sponsors and its selling of small plots of Highland land to raise money.
On its website it says that for prices ranging from £30 to £250 people can help pay for a radio collar, the neutering of a feral cat or a camera trap, and " Supporters obtain a personal right to a souvenir plot of land in Wildernesse Wood and may change John Smith to Lord John Smith of Wildernesse by using documentation we provide."
The Herald contacted Wildcat Haven, but it id not respond.
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