Private investigator posed as WSJ reporter

Nick Kostov of The Wall Street Journal writes about how Jean-Charles Brisard, a well-known corporate security and intelligence consultant who lives in Switzerland and France, posed as Journal reporter William Horobin in a meeting with a hedge fund.

Kostov reports, “Mr. Brisard declined to comment on whether he was involved in the email correspondence. Google didn’t respond to a request for comment.

“The Mr. Horobin who is a Journal reporter declined to comment. A spokeswoman for Dow Jones & Co., publisher of the Journal, said: ‘I can confirm that The Wall Street Journal reporter with this name has made no inquiries’ with Muddy Waters.

“As Mr. Block planned a fact-finding trip to Paris in January 2017, his assistants began receiving unusual inquiries, according to the lawsuit. One came from a person claiming to work at the French stock market regulator. Another came from someone claiming to be the assistant of a high-profile French banker, seeking details on Mr. Block’s Paris schedule.

“In the lawsuit, Muddy Waters said it contacted the Journal’s Mr. Horobin in February and established that he hadn’t been communicating with the firm.

“‘My thinking at that time was I’d like to somehow use this or flip the script,’ Mr. Block said in an interview. When the person impersonating Mr. Horobin proposed a meeting, Mr. Block said he took it, with the intention of confronting him.”

Read more here.