Chaser star Julian Morrow suffers devastating High Court blow after suing a colleague who described him as Lord Voldemort: ‘Ridiculous farce and massive own goal’

By William On Dec 13, 2023

TTelevision star Julian Morrow has lost his latest attempt to overturn a court ruling. He had not been vilified by a former business partner who once called him 'Lord Voldemort'.

The Supreme Court's refusal to grant Morrow leave to appeal an earlier ruling against the founding member of comedy team The Chaser could cost him more than $2.5 million in legal fees.

Morrow had unsuccessfully sued fellow TV producer Nick Murray, who called him the supreme villain of the Harry Potter books and films.

Murray is co-founder and director of CJZ, the production company behind popular shows such as Bondi Rescue, Go Back to Where You Came From and Julia Zemiro's Home Delivery.

Television star Julian Morrow (above) has lost his bid to overturn a court ruling. He was not vilified by a former business partner who once called him 'Lord Voldemort'

After six Supreme Court justices rejected Morrow's appeal, Murray compared his foe to the knight in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, who refuses to give up a fight even after having his four limbs chopped off.

“The whole thing is a ridiculous farce and a massive own goal for Morrow,” Murray told Ny Breaking Australia.

“This case highlights a weakness in the Australian legal system, where we have had to spend millions of dollars defending a lawsuit that had no merit and where Morrow continued to come at us like Monty Python's Black Knight.

“There was no way we could stop the case, which could have destroyed our business, except by spending more money defending the lawsuit, including the hopeless appeal to the Supreme Court.”

Morrow told Ny Breaking Australia the Supreme Court outcome was “disappointing” and referred to some findings made in his favor in the original NSW Supreme Court case.

“I agree with Nick that this is all a ridiculous farce,” he said.

Julian Morrow (second from right) and former business partner Nick Murray co-produced a consumer affairs show called The Checkout (above), which ran for six seasons on the ABC.

Morrow and Murray, who are both legally qualified, had jointly produced the consumer affairs show The Checkout, which ran for six seasons on the ABC from 2013.

The program, which used a satirical sketch-comedy format to highlight deceptive, unfair and unethical practices by major brands, was canceled in 2018.

Murray agreed to sell Morrow his share of the couple's TV production company for $50 before learning that his former partner was pitching a show similar to The Checkout to the ABC without him.

Nick Murray (above) heard that his former partner was pitching a show similar to The Checkout to the ABC without him

Morrow's proposed program, Are You Being Served? fell through after Murray refused to sign a deed to sell their joint venture The Checkout Pty Ltd. to release.

What followed was a multi-year, multi-million dollar legal dispute in which Morrow engaged lawyer Sue Chrysanthou SC to claim that Murray had breached their sales agreement.

Chrysanthou is currently representing Lisa Wilkinson in the defamation case brought by alleged rapist Bruce Lehrmann against the journalist and Network Ten.

She has successfully acted in defamation proceedings in the past for other high-profile clients, including Senator Sarah Hanson-Young and actor Geoffrey Rush.

Murray, whose company also produces Gruen for the ABC, launched a counterclaim that Morrow had engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct in trying to revive The Checkout.

Morrow claimed that a series of angry emails Murray sent to ABC management contained “damaging falsehoods” implying he had fraudulently deceived Murray.

In one email, Murray called Morrow Lord Voldemort and threatened to end Gruen XL – an extended version of the program that airs the night after the original showing – if the national broadcaster developed a show featuring Morrow.

Nick Murray's email to ABC calling Julian Morrow 'Lord Voldemort'

Nick Murray wrote to Michael Carrington, then acting head of content distribution at ABC, on September 13, 2019.

In this edited extract of his email, Murray refers to Julian Morrow as 'Lord Voldemort' and mentions that he has ceased production of Gruen XL.

(Gruen XL was shown on ABC2 the night after Gruen was shown on the main channel and featured additional discussions on the topics covered in the original).

“FYI, we get paid $1,450 a week for Gruen XL. When we agreed to start Gruen XL, we had no idea how difficult it would be to do so. I guess that's why no one else is doing something similar.”

'It's an important exercise for me personally because I'm stopping the show because the rest of the team is working on next week's show on Wednesday. It's very difficult and the result is that I have to spend fourteen hours a day in the editing suite doing two edits and two audio suites at the same time.

'So Gruen XL is a source of frustration.

'That is the background to my comment that my enthusiasm for Gruen XL will diminish to zero under the circumstances you describe below. I have offered to personally repay the $1450 per week, so neither the ABC nor (Cordell Jigsaw) is coming out of their own pocket.

“On the other hand, I am very disappointed by ABC Legal's refusal to provide the documents we were looking for. We are in the middle of this and are getting no help in our efforts to solve the problem. The ABC is in possession of the material with which we can prove or refute our suspicions. We have already spent a huge amount of money on legal fees and this week received another threat of legal action. It's debilitating.

'That's why I don't want to continue Gruen XL if a new show is developed with Lord Voldemort.

'As an aside, I wrote to (ABD's general manager) David Anderson several weeks ago about this matter requesting a meeting, but never heard back. That doesn't seem like a valued partner to me.'

Morrow, who claimed Murray was trying to destroy him and his relationship with the ABC, cited character evidence from witnesses including the broadcaster's medical expert Dr. Norman Swan and former Labor senator Kristina Keneally.

Last year, a NSW Supreme Court judge awarded Morrow defamation damages of $35,000, but the Court of Appeal overturned that ruling.

Judge Christine Adamson found in June that Murray had raised the defense of qualified privilege as the ABC had a commercial interest in the negotiations between him and Morrow, and he had a right to notify management.

She ruled that Morrow had not proven that his former business partner acted with express malice when he sent the emails because he believed his allegations were true.

Morrow is a founding member of the satirical comedy team The Chaser. His unsuccessful lawsuit against Nick Morrow resulted in an order for him to pay an estimated more than $2.5 million in legal fees.

Morrow also failed in his appeal against a finding that he engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct by failing to notify Murray of his attempts to revive The Checkout.

“The failure to disclose his negotiations with the ABC constituted misleading or deceptive conduct,” Judge Adamson ruled.

Morrow's company, The Checkout Pty Ltd, was ordered to pay $500,000 to Murray's company, CJZ – formerly known as Cordell Jigsaw – in damages.

Morrow, who was also ordered to pay Murray's legal fees for both proceedings, said he did 'very disappointed by this outcome'.

“We have to absorb the decision and figure out what is best from now on,” he told Nine Newspapers at the time.

Morrow then attempted to appeal both decisions to the Supreme Court, which denied him leave on December 7 and allowed him to pay Murray's costs.

In the action for attempted defamation, the court found that 'the application does not raise a legal question of public interest and has no clear prospect of success'.

In the commercial appeal, the court stated that 'the grounds for appeal proposed in the petition do not raise a legal question of general interest and have no apparent prospect of success'.