By Jerald Jimenez
01 Feb 2024, 11:57 AM EST
Former United States President Donald Trump suffered a judicial setback this Thursday in London, United Kingdom, where a judge dismissed his lawsuit against Orbis Business Intelligence, the company founded by former British spy Christopher Steele, who created a file of uncorroborated accusations of the ties of the former president with Russia.
Judge Karen Steyn ruled that the case that Trump brought against Orbis was without merit and that there were no grounds to take it to trial: “the claim for compensation and/or damages… is destined to fail,” she said.
Orbis Business Intelligence was the company hired by Steele, a former agent with Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service, also known as MI6, to conduct an investigation into Trump’s possible ties to Russia in 2016. The investigation compiled a dossier that included allegations scandalous things that Russia could use to extort Trump.
For his part, Trump called the file “false” and a political witch hunt. He also accused Orbis of breaching British data protection laws and sought compensation for the damage caused to his reputation.
At a hearing in London in October, Hugh Tomlinson, Trump’s lawyer, said the former president based his lawsuit on two memos in the file that claimed he had participated in “sex parties” in St. Petersburg and had associated with sex workers in Moscow.
Tomlinson said the dossier “contained shocking and outrageous allegations about former President Trump’s personal conduct” and included allegations that he paid bribes to Russian officials to promote his business interests. However, Trump’s argument is that this personal data “is egregiously inaccurate.”
In a written witness statement, Trump said the allegations were “totally false” despite Steele’s claims that they were never refuted.
Trump said he had not engaged in “perverted sexual behavior, including hiring prostitutes… in the presidential suite of a Moscow hotel,” nor had he participated in “sex parties” in St. Petersburg, something that was part of the indictment. He further clarified that he did not bribe Russian officials or provide them with “sufficient material to blackmail me.”
Orbis said the lawsuit should be dismissed because the report should never have been made public and was published by BuzzFeed without permission from Steele or Orbis.
The judge agreed with Orbis and concluded that Trump had “decided to let many years pass since he first became aware of the file” in January 2017.
With information from the Associated Press