Barrister ‘invented spider bite on plane’
Airline says he wants payout to buy house
A BARRISTER who said he nearly lost his leg after being bitten by a spider on a plane has been accused by the airline of making up the story for compensation.
Jonathon Hogg, 43, said the bite caused his leg to ‘burst open’ during the Qatar Airways flight from Doha to Cape Town.
Surgeons had to cut away a large part of his leg where the venom from the brown recluse spider had eaten away the flesh and left him with a gaping hole on his shin.
Mr Hogg, from London, who now works for a technology firm, took legal action against Qatar Airways for damages after undergoing a series of further operations to save his leg. He claimed doctors told him he could have died.
He was on a five-month ‘trip of a lifetime’ when, six hours into the ten-hour flight, he felt a pain in his leg before spotting a spider running across the floor, he claimed.
But the airline disputes the claim, accusing Mr Hogg of ‘fundamental dishonesty’ and arguing he must have been bitten ‘while in Indonesia on a sabbatical holiday on some form of exotic expedition’, the High Court in London heard.
Judge John Leslie said the airline had an anonymous witness who came forward to accuse Mr Hogg of revealing ‘essentially his case was bogus and he was pursuing it because he could not afford to buy a house’.
At a preliminary hearing, the judge ruled Mr Hogg should be told the identity of the witness so his lawyers can explore possible motives for ‘maligning’ him. The airline can only use the witness at a trial once it discloses their identity.
Mark Willems, for Mr Hogg, told the court his client could face an £800,000 legal bill if he loses. He stressed his career was also at risk.
Mr Hogg was travelling to South Africa to dive with sharks in 2015 after a stint at an orangutan sanctuary in Borneo when he claims he was bitten. He said his limb began to deteriorate within days but he did not make the connection until doctors told him he had probably been bitten by an exotic spider. Brown recluse spiders inject necrotic venom, which induces gangrene-like rotting in tissue, and can be deadly.
The case will return to the High Court for a full trial later this year.