Christian Horner threatens legal action to F1 magazine over sext scandal

Red Bull boss Christian Horner is threatening to take action against a Formula 1 magazine in the wake of his sext scandal.

Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner is threatening legal action against a F1 magazine. (Photo by Giuseppe CACACE / AFP)

Red Bull boss Christian Horner is reportedly threatening to take legal action in the wake of his sext scandal.

Private texts sent by the team principal to a female employer were revealed just a day after he was cleared of wrongdoing.

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But now Horner is reportedly threatening to take action against a Formula One magazine that named the employee with whom he was sending the lewd messages to, according to The Telegraph.

The report states the magazine’s website generated so much interest with its article that the entire site crashed.

Horner’s lawyers at Harbottle & Lewis are reported to have sent a pair of legal letters to the magazine accusing it of “publishing an unlawful article that was defamatory but also preached privacy and data protection rights”.

They also demanded the article be removed.

The scandal remains in the spotlight. (Photo by Clive Mason/Getty Images)

A Red Bull spokesman told the Telegraph that “the piece is littered with inaccuracies and is subject to legal complaint”.

Tom Rubython, the magazine’s 68-year-old editor and author of the article, confirmed he had been contacted by Horner’s lawyers but is not unpublishing the piece at this stage.

“We’ve actually said to them, we’re not taking the article down from our website … if they want that to happen, they have got to seek an injunction,” he told the Telegraph.

“ … The website is overwhelmed with thousands of people trying to access the report … it is designed for 50 or so users a day.”

Geri and Christian rocked up hand-in-hand at Bahrain. (Photo by Clive Mason/Getty Images)

Horner was cleared by Red Bull ahead of the season opening Bahrain Grand Prix having continually denied the accusations levelled against him.

The spotlight was however thrust back onto Red Bull after the leaking of messages and photos sent by the team boss.

The series of WhatsApp messages, which also mention Horner’s wife Geri Halliwell, were sent from an anonymous email to hundreds of journalists.

While there doesn’t appear to be any explicit images in the messages, some of the texts are sexually suggestive in nature.

In response to the leak, Horner released a statement that read: “I won’t comment on anonymous speculation but to reiterate I have always denied the allegations, I respected the integrity of the independent investigation and fully co-operated with it every step of the way.

“It was a thorough and fair investigation conducted by an independent specialist barrister and it has concluded dismissing the complaint made. I remain fully focused on the start of the season.”