A family wrongly accused of leaving a pub without paying for their food are multi-millionaires who sued to restore their reputation.
Peter and Ann McGirr, and their adult children Peter Jr and Carol, were shamed on Facebook by the Horse and Jockey, who said they hadn’t paid their £150 bill in July last year.
The pub, in Tideswell, Derbyshire, circulated CCTV pictures of the family, claiming they enjoyed two ribeye steaks, two gammon steaks, and several beers without coughing up.
It later turned out a member of staff had taken a payment but forgot to ring the transaction through the till.
The Horse and Jockey has now been left with a £140,000 bill in damages and legal fees, despite a last ditch attempt to make up with their wealthy customers.
The landlord even flew out to visit the family in Belfast, begging them to drop their legal action in return for a complimentary meal and an apology, MailOnline reports.
But the family, from County Tyrone, Northern Ireland, had an ‘excellent reputation’ in the local area they wanted to protect.
A family friend of the McGirrs, who run and own an internationally renowned engineering company, told MailOnline: ‘They are very well known and respected in the Omagh area and are one of the wealthiest families around here.
‘Everybody was very shocked when these allegations were first made because the McGirrs are not short of a pound or two.
‘It was a very difficult time for the family because they knew all along that they were innocent.’
So they continued to sue, saying they had suffered significant embarrassment and reputational bias after they appeared in news reports.
They took the pub to Belfast Crown Court for libel on the basis of the ‘serious and defamatory accusations’, which included calling them dine and dashers.
Their barrister, Peter Girvan, said: ‘These articles contained serious and defamatory accusations that the plaintiffs had engaged in dishonest and criminal conduct by deliberately absconding without settling a bill of approximately £150.
‘The allegations were entirely false. The plaintiffs had not engaged in any such conduct, and the statements made by the defendants had no factual basis.’
The pub agreed to pay £75,000 in damages as well as the family’s legal costs as part of a settlement, which is estimted at £40,000.
The Horse and Jockey’s own legal costs are expected to also cost the pub back £20,000.
They accepted there was no basis whatsoever for the allegations and apologised, the court heard.
Following the settlement, daughter Carol McGirr, uploaded a post to Facebook, saying: ’10 months later.. thank god it’s all over and our names are cleared.
‘Tip for all our friends and family: don’t pay for your food and drink before you eat as this is what can happen.. plus use a card otherwise we had [sic] no evidence of payment.’
The McGirr’s family engineering business, McGirr Engineering, is worth more than £2 million and has cash reserves of £1.3 million, according to Companies House.
They employ around 20 people and sell specialist machines worth up to £150,000 around the world.
Reading a statement on the family’s behalf, their solicitor Darragh Carney, said they had been vindicated and were very satisfied with the settlement.
After the incident, the pub blamed the mistake on an inexperienced member of staff who took payment via a card machine but had not printed the bill on the till.
In a statement, the pub said: ‘We want to sincerely apologise to the people involved because we have now learnt that they did in fact pay for their meal.
‘There was no dishonesty involved from our staff, it was an honest mistake but we have dismissed the member of staff responsible for the error.’
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