Elon Musk defends 'pedo guy' tweet in defamation trial

Tesla co-founder Elon Musk has said that he did not literally call a British caver a pedophile during their infamous spat on Twitter, telling a Los Angeles court that he had simply defended himself from unprovoked insults.

The tech billionaire told the defamation trial jury he had been "upset" when he described British diver Vernon Unsworth -- who helped rescue youth soccer players trapped in a cave in Thailand -- as "pedo guy" in a tweet.

During the July 2018 row, Unsworth had described the 48-year-old entrepreneur's proposal to build a mini-submarine to rescue the boys as a "PR stunt."
Musk was questioned by Unsworth's attorney Lin Wood about comments made by the caver, who had said the custom-built device would never have fit in the cave and suggested that Musk could "stick his submarine where it hurts."
He also suggested in emails to the website BuzzFeed News that Unsworth was a "child rapist."