The former captain of a prestigious London yacht club, who led a campaign against the club’s commodore over mooring fees for his 80-foot Dutch barge, has been cleared of harassment allegations at London’s High Court.
Stefan Oloffs, the former cruiser captain at Greenwich Yacht Club, faced accusations of harassing then-club commodore Richard Phillips.
The online campaign, dubbed “Barge Gate”, saw Mr Oloffs suggest that Mr Phillips had received “preferential treatment” due to his position when securing a mooring for his barge, Verandering.
Mr Oloffs had accused Mr Phillips of “”misusing his position within the club” in order to dodge the significant mooring fees.
His campaign included publishing claims against Mr Phillips on a WhatsApp messaging group comprising 230 club members, submitting a written complaint to the Port of London Authority about the commodore’s conduct, and even creating a “Barge Gate” website about him.
An internal yacht club inquiry had cleared Mr Phillips of evading mooring fees, finding “no financial impropriety”.
Mr Oloffs was expelled from the club on 27 January 2024, for reasons including “spreading claims about a member which appeared to be defamatory”, a decision that he is currently appealing.
Mr Phillips ended up suing Mr Oloffs at London’s High Court. He claimed that he was on the receiving end of a “public campaign of harassment” which had left him suffering “significant distress, loss of sleep, anxiety and public embarrassment”, as well as “humiliation and loss of dignity”.
The High Court has now cleared Mr Oloffs of the harassment allegations.
He sued for £20,000 compensation, but Mr Oloffs’ barrister claimed that the case could end up costing the losing party a total of £300,000 if it went to trial.
Mr Oloffs, in response, mounted his own court bid to get the harassment claim struck out, labelling it “wholly unnecessary” and motivated by Mr Phillips’ wish for “recrimination and financial oppression” against him.
In a new ruling dismissing the bulk of Mr Phillips’ court case, Mrs Justice Hill has thrown out his harassment suit, ruling that Mr Phillips’ claims and comments were insufficiently serious to qualify for the “quasi-criminal” offence of harassment.
Mr Oloffs’ actions may well have caused the ex-commodore “irritation, annoyance and upset”, the judge said. However: “I do not consider that Mr Phillips has a real prospect of showing at trial that Mr Oloffs’ conduct crossed the boundary to being ‘oppressive and unacceptable’ thus meeting the threshold for harassment under the Protection from Harassment Act”.
The court heard that the two men had at one point each had positions on the yacht club’s council, with Mr Phillips starting out as head of IT before being appointed rear commodore, then full commodore in December 2022.
The pair began arguing after each “expressed different views” about how far “social activities” benefited the club, and they later also bickered about how to boost participation in cruiser sailing.
But they ultimately fell out over the barge issue, with Mr Oloffs later being expelled from the yacht club in 2024 and Mr Phillips also giving up his commodore post.
The pair clashed due to Mr Phillips needing a berth for his 80-foot barge, Verandering, which he had relocated to London with a view to selling.
In June 2023, Mr Oloffs accused him of “underpaying” mooring fees for his vessel at the club, although the commodore said he had in fact paid £15,000 for the berth.
Despite an internal investigation “exonerating” the then commodore of any financial misconduct, his lawyers claimed that his former club colleague subsequently “ran a public campaign of harassment” against him in a bid to blacken his good name, leaving Mr Phillips plagued by “distress, humiliation, embarrassment and loss of dignity”.
On the “Welcome to Barge Gate” homepage of his website, Mr Oloffs said that its aim was to “highlight a conflict of interest concerning a director of the club and the subsequent cover up by the club management”, later promoting his website when he handed out flyers at the January 2024 “Club Night”.
And in a further “Welcome to Barge Gate” message, he claimed that “all discussion on Barge Gate was quelled by the commodore in collaboration with the flag officers and the other committee members” and that he, as a “mutinous” member, was “hauled in front of the committee in January 2024 and expelled”.
Mr Oloffs had also complained about the barge to the Port of London Authority, alleging that it was “moored illegally and created a risk of drowning”. The commodore relocated it two months later.
Mr Phillips formally complained about Mr Oloffs’ conduct through his lawyers in February 2024, prompting the former cruiser skipper to take down his website and to make clear that “an apology was on offer”.
But the row then went to court, with Mr Phillips alleging not only harassment, but also breach of confidence, misuse of private information and breach of the UK Data Protection Act by publishing his private information.
After a day in court in June, the judge has now thrown out all the claims, except for allegations that Mr Oloffs breached the ex-commodore’s data rights by disclosing his private information on his website.
She said that Mr Phillips had “no real prospect of succeeding on the harassment claim”.
There was no likelihood of Mr Phillips’ lawyers demonstrating that Mr Oloffs’ conduct “met the necessary seriousness threshold”, added Mrs Justice Hill.
She added: “I do not accept (the) submission that the scale of Mr Oloffs’ campaign against Mr Phillips was so ‘remarkable’ that it arguably met the quasi-criminal threshold.
“At its simplest, it amounted to one email, 10 WhatsApp messages sent over two days, a complaint to the PLA, and the website, which Mr Oloffs then promoted.
“This is especially so, given the context of robust debate in the club environment, where the claimant also made serious counter-allegations about the defendant’s conduct in the club.“
She granted Mr Oloffs summary judgment in his favour in relation to Mr Phillips’ claims for harassment, breach of confidence and misuse of private information, as well as his data breach claim in relation to Mr Oloffs’ use of social media.
The issue of whether Mr Oloffs breached private data rights on his “Barge Gate” website must be decided at another hearing unless, after further legal argument, the judge decides the issue is too minor to be tried.
Greenwich Yacht Club, which is located about three miles downriver from Tower Bridge, has more than 400 members and hosts facilities for dinghies, cruisers, and rowing.
The club was originally founded by Thames watermen and river workers in 1908. It once had its venue at a riverside hut, but in 2000 relocated to its current platform in the middle of the river itself.
