Hells Angel’s lawyer says blogger reneged on agreement

A lawyer for a Hells Angel appeared in court Wednesday seeking to enforce an agreement she says a Surrey blogger made to stop publishing defamatory articles about her client.

In June, Damiano Dipopolo, who is employed as a longshoreman and is also a member of the motorcycle gang, filed a lawsuit alleging Dennis Watson had defamed him on his “gangstersout” blog.

Dipopolo sought to have an injunction ordering that Watson remove the offending articles and stop publishing any further defamatory material.

On Wednesday, Suzan ElKhatib, a lawyer for Dipopolo, told B.C. Supreme Court Justice Ronald Skolrood that following email communications with her, Watson and a lawyer working with him had in June reached what amounted to a binding agreement to pull the articles from his website.

But she said on July 17, she received a message from Watson that he had had a “change of heart” and did not want to be bound by the agreement.

“Now he wants to renege,” she told the judge.

Watson, a father of two who has been running his blog for six years, denied there had been an agreement and told the judge he didn’t want to give up his free speech.

“I had a momentary lapse of insanity,” he said of the alleged agreement. “I was under duress.”

The judge asked Watson if he was aware that if he declined to enforce the agreement, Dipopolo could proceed with a defamation suit. Watson said he was prepared for that possibility.

In response to Watson’s submissions, El-Khatib told the judge there was no evidence of any duress and said Watson’s admission he’d had a lapse meant he was conceding there had been an agreement.

“The fact that he’s now changed his mind, that’s not the law. At the time, he understood what he was agreeing to.”

The judge said he would give his ruling Friday morning on Dipopolo’s application for an enforcement order.