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Here's what Barrow told us about why the PM's grounds of appeal did not withstand the court's scrutiny:

Dean Barrow, SC, Attorney for Karen Bevans
"They challenged everything. They said the words were really defamatory. The meanings that the judge found were pleaded by us. The judge went above and beyond what we had alleged the words to mean. They said that, in any event, the words are true. And they said. Therefore, they were entitled to succeed on the defense of justification, or alternatively, that the words were fair comment. And then, ultimately, they attacked the damages, saying that the quantum of the award was outsized and inordinate. They obviously lost on every point. My response? It can hardly be gainsaid by any reasonable person that what the Prime Minister said didn't libel Mrs. Bevans. Nobody who heard that will conclude other than that this is defamatory of the lady. So, I figured they never had at times with that. Justification? Justification can only succeed if you can prove that what you said is true, what was said about her, how she got the contract when she got it -not true. So, they had to fail on that. Comment? Your comment has to be fair but has to be based on a factual substratum, as they called it. What the Prime Minister said was basically not a comment. It was all factual. They said, 'But he was talking about the need for reform.' Yeah, but he was saying - you can argue that's a comment. But he was saying, 'We need to reform so we can stop this abuse that, in fact, has just happened.' You can't - no abuse happened. You said abuse happened, but it didn't happen. So, that fell. And then, in terms of damages, well, they claim that the next closest award, or the one that we were closest to, is the Site River Wildlife Award. There the libel consisted of allegations that the claimants that won were guilty of crimes. And there was no suggestion here that Mrs. Bevans was guilty of a crime."

Daniel Ortiz
"But they did allege that she got the contract through corruption."

Dean Barrow, SC, Attorney for Karen Bevans
"Corruption, so it was just as bad."

We also asked Barrow to discuss the insistence from Love FM that their report and interview with Prime Minister Briceno are protected by the journalism principles of fair comment and qualified privilege. Here's what he had to say about his arguments to the Court of Appeal that these lines of defense are not available to them in this case:

Daniel Ortiz
"I also noticed that the litigants, RSV Media, tried to insist on fair comment on qualified privilege. Explain to us why they failed on those."

Dean Barrow, SC, Attorney for Karen Bevans
"Well, fair comment because, again, what they published from the Prime Minister was not comment. It was facts or purported to be facts. Furthermore, they had a copy of the contract. They published what the Prime Minister said without weighing what he said against the contents of the contract. If they had done that, they would have known that the number of things he said, well, it-"

Daniel Ortiz
"doesn't make any sense."

Dean Barrow, SC, Attorney for Karen Bevans
"They didn't. They didn't attempt to fact-check. Most important of all, they didn't get Mrs. Bevans's side of the story. This is where they really broke down because in court at the trial for the first time, Miss Trujillo said, 'Oh, but I did try to reach her before I published the story.' I did try to reach Mrs. Bevans, but she didn't answer. I had put to her during cross-examination, 'But you gave a witness statement before you actually came to court to give live evidence. You didn't say that anywhere in your witness statement. She said, 'Well...' [She] couldn't explain it. 'Where's the evidence of the call?' 'Well my call log was full, so I erased it.' I said, 'Fine. When you tried to reach Mrs. Bevans about a month or two later, in relation now to the second set of statements that the Prime Minister had made about digging in his heels and saying, 'She won't like it if she goes down this road.' You tried to call her then. You said you didn't get her then either, but you sent her WhatsApp messages. So, you have proof that on that second occasion, you did try to - why, if she wasn't answering the phone on this material location, you didn't send her a WhatsApp message? You said you can't show us that you made the calls because you cleared the call log. But WhatsApp messages? No, man. You didn't try to get in touch with the lady at all. And that's what the court found, that she couldn't be believed, and the court concluded no effort was made to get in touch with Mrs. Bevan to give her a chance to offer her side of the story. That meant that the qualified privilege defense, the responsible journalism defense that Love had mounted, absolutely was demolished."

So, does Barrow anticipate that the appellants will attempt to press this case at the Caribbean Court of Justice? He told us that he hopes that they won't since it costs his client a lot of money to defend against these appeals:

Dean Barrow, SC, Attorney for Karen Bevans
"Give it up, man, Lord. It's... It's been a trial for Mrs. Bevans. She's been vindicated in the court below and now, but of course, every time she has to resist an appeal, it costs her money. If she wins, then there will be an award of costs. But the award of costs that the court will give is not going to be on all-fours. It's not going to be the exact equivalent of what she has to pay in lawyer's fees. These things are complex. As you know, I have been here from nine until just maybe an hour ago, straight through without lunch, all the submissions that we've had to prepare beforehand. It's just a mountain of preparation, hours and hours, and we have to charge. So you, if the Prime Minister appeals to the CCJ, that's another set of costs for Mrs. Bevans. I would appeal to him to give it up. It's over. You win some; you lose some. He's lost this one, and I think properly so. But give it the rest."

Barrow tells us that Bevans has already been paid the award of damages, and if the Court of Appeal overturned the case, she would have had to pay it back.