“Daphne’s Law”: The European Commission introduces an anti-SLAPP initiative

When Daphne Caruana Galizia was assassinated in Malta on 16th October 2017, 48 defamation cases were pending against her in Maltese and other courts. Daphne was at the peak of her journalistic powers when she was killed, producing a seemingly endless exposé of criminality involving government and private sector actors. Naturally, those she was exposing did not take kindly to the intrusion on the enjoyment of the fruits of their labour. Courts which offered few meaningful safeguards against vexatious litigation presented a nominally legitimate forum in which they would seek to exhaust and punish Daphne and to ensure that others did not engage in similar investigations. Most of these cases were inherited by her sons, whose grief was interrupted constantly by a need to appear in court in defence of their mother’s work.