Defamation

Nevyas v. Morgan

Date: 

11/07/2003

Threat Type: 

Lawsuit

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

Dominic J. Morgan; Steven A. Friedman

Type of Party: 

Individual
Organization

Type of Party: 

Individual

Court Type: 

State

Court Name: 

Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas City Hall; Superior Court of Pennsylvania

Case Number: 

031100946 (trial); J.A32030-06 (appeal)

Legal Counsel: 

Steven A. Friedman, Carl H. Hanzelik, and Paul Alan Levy (for Morgan); Jeffrey B. Albert (for Friedman)

Publication Medium: 

Website

Relevant Documents: 

Status: 

Pending

Disposition: 

Injunction Denied
Injunction Issued
Material Removed
Material Reinstated

Description: 

The plaintiffs, Nevyas, Nevyas-Wallace, and Nevyas Eye Associates, brought suit in November 2003 for damages and injunctive relief for defamation and breach of contract for statements about their LASIK eye surgery practice posted online by a former patient, Dominic Morgan. A motion for temporary restraining order was denied in 2003 by the Common Pleas Court in Philadelphia County, and the plaintiffs subsequently also brought suit in federal court when the defendant made further additions to his website. The federal claims were dismissed in 2004. The state court claims proceeded to trial in July 2005, and the trial court granted an injunction in favor of the plaintiffs.  On appeal, the Superior Court of Pennsylvania vacated the injunction in March 2007 and remanded the case to the trial court for futher proceedings. 

Dr. Nevyas-Wallace performed elective LASIK eye surgery on the defendant Dominic Morgan in 1998. Displeased with the results, Morgan commenced a medical malpractice action against Nevyas-Wallace, Nevyas, and the clinic, Nevyas Eye Associates. Ultimately, the dispute was resolved through arbitration. According to the complaint, Morgan created a website that contained numerous defamatory statements. (Compl. ¶ 17).  The plaintiffs contend that they entered into an agreement with Morgan in August 2003 in which Morgan agreed to remove all defamatory material and references to the plaintiffs from the website, and in return the plaintiffs would forego filing suit against him. (Compl. ¶ 20) In November 2003, the plaintiffs discovered a reconstructed website containing what they contend were defamatory statements. (Compl. ¶¶ 21-22).

The plaintiffs filed a petition for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction on November 10, 2003, but the motions were denied on November 18, 2003. The case proceeded to a non-jury trial limited to specific performance of the contract on July 26, 2005. The trial court granted an injunction in favor of the plaintiffs on October 19, 2005, forbidding Morgan from mentioning the Nevyases at all on his website.

On appeal, the court found that Morgan did not waive his right to make critical statements in the future and he had specifically reserved the right to update his website. Thus, the Superior Court of Pennsylvania vacated the order granting the injunction and remanded the case to trial court for determination of whether the statements were defamatory and whether the statements posted in November were the same as the statements posted in July 2003. Nevyas v. Morgan, 2007 PA Super. 66.

Related case in federal court: CMLP: Nevyas v. Morgan II (federal lawsuit).

Jurisdiction: 

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CMLP Notes: 

AVM- 7/19/09 - fixing the links and dome formatting. Note, the neyvas link is a segmented pdf, I think we should decompress and repackage.

AVM- 7/22/09 - took a while but able to desegment and repackage complaint pdf

Federal suit is here 309 F.Supp.2d 673

Jim Dolan Shows Why Anti-SLAPP Laws Are Good (And Why New York Needs a Better One)

Now, I am not from New York.  Thus, I don't know much about Jim Dolan, the owner of Cablevision, Newsday, Madison Square Garden, and the New York Knicks.  But the local press offers a sense of the man.  The New York Daily News said that he is "a little bit wacky, lashing out indiscriminately behind the scenes, speaking nonsense whenever he talks at all.&q

Jurisdiction: 

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American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine v. Wikimedia

Date: 

08/19/2009

Threat Type: 

Lawsuit

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.; John or Jane Does 1-10

Type of Party: 

Individual
Organization

Type of Party: 

Individual
Large Organization
Intermediary

Court Type: 

State

Court Name: 

Supreme Court of the State of New York, County of New York

Case Number: 

111917-2009

Publication Medium: 

Wiki

Relevant Documents: 

Status: 

Pending

Description: 

The American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine (A4M) and its co-founders Robert M. Goldman and Ronald M. Klatz sued Wikimedia Foundation and ten anonymous posters for defamation in New York state court over comments appearing on A4M's Wikipedia page. In their complaint, plaintiffs allege that anonymous posters published statements disparaging their scientific qualifications and medical credentials and implying that they were implicated in illegal trafficking of human growth hormones and anabolic steriods. The complaint purports to include Wikimedia "solely as a nominal Defendant," and A4M seeks to identify the anonymous posters through discovery.

Jurisdiction: 

Subject Area: 

Priority: 

1-High

Canadian Court Rejects Defamation Liability for Hyperlinks: Crookes v. Newton

Jurisdiction: 

Subject Area: 

Sarah Palin v. "Gryphen"

Date: 

08/01/2009

Threat Type: 

Correspondence

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

Gryphen

Type of Party: 

Individual

Type of Party: 

Individual

Publication Medium: 

Blog

Relevant Documents: 

Description: 

On August 1, 2009, Sarah Palin's lawyer sent a cease and desist letter to Alaskan blogger "Gryphen" over a post published earlier that day on Gryphen's blog ImmoralMinority.  

The cease and deist letter takes issue with a number of statements made in the post "Exclusive! Sarah and Todd Palin are Splitsville!," including the statements that Palin "has purchased land in Montana" and that "Todd Palin pulled a gun on Levi [Johnston] in a heated exchange" in 2008.

The cease and desist letter demanded a retraction by 3:00 pm AST on August 1, 2009.  The letter further requested information on how Gryphen would like to be served with a complaint and summons should s/he decline to retract the post.  The next day, Gryphen responded to the letter with a post asserting that
s/he believed the factual information received from her sources to be
correct. As of September 17, 2009, there is no information that a legal action has been initiated.

Jurisdiction: 

Content Type: 

Subject Area: 

Priority: 

1-High

Admission Consultants, Inc. v. Google

Date: 

11/13/2007

Threat Type: 

Subpoena

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

Google Inc.

Type of Party: 

Organization

Type of Party: 

Large Organization
Intermediary

Court Type: 

State

Court Name: 

Supreme Court of the State of New York, New York County

Case Number: 

115190/07

Legal Counsel: 

Tonia Ouellette Klausner - Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati

Publication Medium: 

Forum

Relevant Documents: 

Status: 

Concluded

Disposition: 

Subpoena Quashed

Description: 

Admission Consultants, Inc. filed a motion for pre-action discovery in New York court, asking Google for identifying information relating to two email addresses tied to anonymous posts to a forum about business schools on BusinessWeek.com. The objected-to comments criticized the company in various regards.  In one, the commenter stated that he was shocked at Admission Consultants' lack of response to its unsatisfied customers.  In another, the commenter stated that he agreed with the statements on the message thread that Admission Consultants was not a legitimate company.  In a third, the commenter said that "[t]hese guys sound like complete crooks." 

In a December 2008 decision, the court denied Admission Consultants' request for discovery, finding that the comments could not support a defamation claim because they were statements of opinion, not fact.  Therefore, Admission Consultants could not show that it had " a meritorious cause of action and that the information being sought is material and necessary to the actionable wrong," as required for pre-action discovery in New York.  The court also ruled that a message on a forum that "bumped" the messages above it did not constitute a "republication of the defamation for every message posted previously."

Jurisdiction: 

Content Type: 

Subject Area: 

Priority: 

1-High

Subject Area: 

Chang v. Greenwald

Date: 

07/17/2009

Threat Type: 

Subpoena

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

David Greenwald; Google Inc.

Type of Party: 

Individual

Type of Party: 

Individual
Large Organization
Intermediary

Court Type: 

State

Court Name: 

Superior Court of the State of California, Sacramento County

Case Number: 

No. 34-2009-00033484

Legal Counsel: 

Donald B. Mooney - Law Offices of Donald B. Mooney

Publication Medium: 

Blog

Relevant Documents: 

Status: 

Pending

Description: 

On September 9, 2009, Superior Court Judge Shelleyanne Chang ruled (scroll to Item 7) on blogger David Greenwald's motion to quash a subpoena seeking the identity of commenters to his blog, the People's Vanguard of Davis. Judge Chang decided that former UC Davis police officer Calvin Chang (no relation to the judge) cannot obtain directly any identifying information for the commenters in question, but he can employ a third-party expert to determine whether the comments were posted by specific UC Davis personnel whose names Chang will provide in advance.

This summer, Mr. Chang's attorney served the subpoena on Google, Greenwald's former blog host, as part of Chang's employment discrimination and breach of contract action against the UC Davis.  Greenwald published blog entries about Chang's lawsuit back in February 2009, a few days after the suit was filed, and several readers posted negative comments about Chang and his case. The subpoena seeks identifying information for seven anonymous and pseudonymous comments.  Chang maintains that the individuals who left these comments are "managing agents" of the university, and that the comments themselves constitute evidence of breach of a previous settlement agreement by the university. Google informed Greenwald of the subpoena, and he challenged it, arguing that the First Amendment protects the rights of his commenters to speak anonymously and that the information is not relevant to Chang's suit against the university.

The court largely agreed with Greenwald's arguments, finding that Chang "has not made the requisite prima facie showing of a valid libel claim against [the commenters] in order to justify the requested disclosure of their personal information," apparently in a subtle nod to Krinsky v. Doe 6, 72 Cal. Rptr. 3d 231 (Cal. Ct. App. 2008), a California appellate decision Greenwald relied on heavily. The court went on to explain that Chang's opposition papers "nowhere showed or attempted to show that the comments posted to the blog were 'assertions of fact which are provably false' and not non-actionable opinions, as required by Paterno v. Superior Court (Ampersand Publishing) (2008) 163 Cal. App.4th 1342, 1349-1350."  The court therefore concluded that Chang failed to justify the disclosure of the posters' identity in order to proceed with libel claims against them.

But, the court recognized that "if the comments posted on the blog were authored by 'managing agents' of the university, they would constitute evidence relevant to existing claims against the university." The court found that Chang "identified specific reasons" to believe that the postings were made by university personnel because of "the use of unique terms" and "reference to information not generally known." Still, the court worried about stripping unrelated Internet speakers of their anonymity without justification and therefore imposed the following conditions on Chang's discovery of the identity of the posters to the blog:

  • At his own expense, Chang will retain an independent third party to perform an IP address trace of the sources of the comments posted to the blog;
  • Chang will provide the third party with the names of the specific university personnel believed to have posted the comments;
  • The third party will be the "exclusive recipient" of records and information produced by Google or Greenwald in response to the subpoena or similar subpoenas seeking the identify of the commenters;
  • If the third party determines that any of the comments were posted by the specific university personnel identified in advance by Chang, then he/she will release the associated records and information to the parties; and
  • If the third party determines that any of the postings were not authored by someone on Chang's list, then he/she will be prohibited from releasing any records or information relating to the posting(s) or individual(s).

Jurisdiction: 

Content Type: 

Subject Area: 

Priority: 

1-High

Citing Anti-SLAPP Law, New York Court Dismisses Libel Case Against Unmasked Commenter

Long before Liskula Cohen's case brought online anonymity into the m

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Will Glenn Beck Sue a Defamatory Website in 2009?

Even though Glenn Beck has a prime spot on cable television to offer up his beliefs, it's sometimes quite hard to understand what his beliefs actually are.  For example, as Jon Stewart has pointed out, he believes we have the best healthcare in the world, except when he says it's a nightmare.  Or as Politico underscored, he believes that

Subject Area: 

Ottinger v. Tiekert

Date: 

09/04/2008

Threat Type: 

Lawsuit

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

Stuart Tiekert

Type of Party: 

Individual

Type of Party: 

Individual

Court Type: 

State

Court Name: 

Supreme Court of the State of New York, Westchester County

Case Number: 

016429/2008

Legal Counsel: 

Debra S. Cohen

Publication Medium: 

Forum

Relevant Documents: 

Status: 

Pending

Disposition: 

Dismissed (total)

Description: 

Former House Representative Richard Ottinger and his wife, June Ottinger, filed a John Doe lawsuit in New York state court over anonymous comments posted on a forum on LoHud.com.  In a special proceeding for pre-action discovery, the court ordered The Journal News, publisher of LoHud.com, to turn over the commenter's identifying information.  The Ottingers then amended the complaint to name Stuart Tiekert as a defendant.

According to court documents, Tiekert's comments related to a renovation project the Ottingers were carrying out on their home in Mamaroneck, New York, for which they sought various building permits. Some of the Ottingers' neighbors and local activists attended meetings held in connection with approvals and permits that the Ottingers needed, and one neighbor — Susan McCrory — stated her belief at a televised public meeting that the deed for the Ottinger property was "invalid" and "fraudulent."  The next day, Tiekert posted comments on LoHud suggesting that the Ottingers' deed was fraudulent, and that the Ottingers had used political pressure and bribery to obtain the requisite permits for the project.  The Ottingers sued, maintaining that these statements were false and defamatory. 

Tiekert filed a motion for summary judgment and attorneys' fees under New York's anti-SLAPP statutes, N.Y. Civ. Rights Law §§ 70-a, 76-a and N.Y. C.P.L.R. §§ 3211(g), 3212(h). He also filed a counterclaim alleging that he was entitled to damages based on the Ottingers' filing of a SLAPP.

In August 2009, the court granted Tiekert's motion for summary judgment, finding that the action "involves public petition and participation brought by a public applicant, and which action is materially related to the defendant's efforts to comment on, challenge, or oppose said application," thus triggering the New York anti-SLAPP law.  The court further held that the Ottingers "failed to demonstrate that their action has a substantial basis in fact or law, or is supported by a substantial argument for an extension, modification, or reversal of any existing law" and therefore dismissed the action. 

The court's precise reasoning on the latter point is not clear, but it may relate to the Ottingers' inability to prove by clear and convincing evidence that Tiekert made the statements in question with knowledge of, or reckless disregard for, their falsity, particularly in light of McCrory's public statements the previous day.

The court determined, however, that Tiekert was not entitled to compensatory or punitive damages because it found that the lawsuit was not "brought to harass, intimidate, punish, or otherwise maliciously inhibit the free exercise of speech."  The court also declined to award Tiekert attorneys' fees and costs.

Jurisdiction: 

Content Type: 

Subject Area: 

Kinay v. TCI Journal

Date: 

08/19/2009

Threat Type: 

Lawsuit

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

John Does

Type of Party: 

Individual
Organization

Type of Party: 

Individual

Court Type: 

State

Court Name: 

Superior Court of the State of California, Santa Clara County

Case Number: 

1-09-CV-150301

Publication Medium: 

Website

Relevant Documents: 

Status: 

Pending

Description: 

A resort developer filed a John Doe lawsuit in California state court against the anonymous operators of TCI Journal, an online newspaper that reports on government corruption in the Turks & Caicos Islands. According to press acounts, Dr. Cem Kinay alleges that TCI Journal defamed him by posting articles linking him to government corruption in the former British colony.

After filing the lawsuit, Kinay subpoenaed Google to turn over identifying information and IP address log-in history for the Gmail account tcijournal@gmail.com.  Google notified its subscriber that it would comply with the subpoena unless provided with a copy of a motion to quash or other formal objection filed in court by September 6, 2009. A Google spokesperson issued the following statement to a reporter with ReadWriteWeb:

"When Google receives legal process, such as court orders and subpoenas, where possible we promptly provide notice to users to allow them to object to those requests for information. Users may raise any and all objections they feel are relevant, including First Amendment arguments. In addition, we are still evaluating all our legal options regarding this particular request."

As of September 9, no formal objection to the subpoena had been filed.

Jurisdiction: 

Content Type: 

Subject Area: 

CMLP Notes: 

http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Gmail_may_hand_over_IP_addresses_of_journalists

 

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/google_may_hand_over_muckraking_jou...

 

Google may turn over login information about a political blogging site because of a subpoena.  

Priority: 

1-High

Sturm v. eBay

Date: 

02/14/2006

Threat Type: 

Lawsuit

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

eBay, Inc.

Type of Party: 

Individual

Type of Party: 

Large Organization

Court Type: 

State

Court Name: 

California Superior Court, Santa Clara county

Case Number: 

1-06-CV-057926

Legal Counsel: 

Melina K. Patterson - Cooley Godward LLP

Publication Medium: 

Website

Status: 

Concluded

Disposition: 

Dismissed (total)
Material Removed

Description: 

Kiel J. Sturm sued eBay, Inc. for defamation after it refused to remove a comment critical of him left by a buyer, even after he obtained a court order ruling that the comment was defamatory.

According to articles in the San Jose Mercury News and Yahoo! Tech, Sturm initially sued the person responsible for the comment in small claims court.  After settling the matter, both parties sent a letter to eBay requesting that the comment be removed.  eBay responded that it required a court order stating that the comment was defamatory, so Sturm re-sued the buyer to get such an order.  When he presented it to eBay, however, eBay refused once again to remove the offending comment, stating that the court order contained "too many ambiguities."

At that point, Sturm sued eBay directly.  According to Eric Goldman at the Technology & Marketing Law Blog, the court dismissed the case on July 27, 2006, finding that Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act ("Section 230") provided eBay with immunity from liability for the buyer's comments.

According to the Mercury News article, eBay eventually removed the offending comment.

Jurisdiction: 

Content Type: 

Subject Area: 

CMLP Notes: 

Cannot find the opinion anywhere; links on Eric Goldman's blog post are dead, and Patterson (eBay's lawyer) is no longer with Cooley (LB 08/07/2009)

Cash4Gold v. Liberis

Date: 

03/12/2009

Threat Type: 

Lawsuit

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

Michele Liberis; Consumer Media LLC d/b/a Consumerist.com; Elizabeth Arden d/b/a ComplaintsBoard.com

Type of Party: 

Organization

Type of Party: 

Individual
Organization

Court Type: 

State

Court Name: 

Circuit Court of the Seventeenth Judicial Circuit, Broward County, Florida

Case Number: 

09-014536 (09)

Publication Medium: 

Website

Relevant Documents: 

Status: 

Pending

Description: 

In March 2009, Cash4Gold sued Michele Liberis, a former employee, for defamation based on a post Liberis submitted to the consumer watchdog website Complaints Board

As described in Cash4Gold's complaint, the posting contained numerous allegations of unsavory business practices.  One of Liberis's claims was that checks were often held for several days before being mailed, thereby narrowing the window for consumers to invoke the company's 10-day satisfaction guarantee.  (Compl. ¶13)  The claims were later featured in a post on Consumerist.com, a sister publication of Consumer Reports.

In June, Cash4Gold obtained a default judgment and injunction
against the Liberis, prohibiting her from "publishing any more confidential,proprietary information, and any defamatory information on the
internet."  In July, Cash4Gold contacted Consumerist.com and Complaints Board, demanding that they remove the posts referring to Liberis's allegations. 

When neither website complied, Cash4Gold filed a 19-page amended complaint, suing Consumerist.com and Complaints Board for defamation per se and injunctive relief based on Liberis' original post and Consumerist.com's article detailing Liberis' allegations.

Update: 

9/11/2009 - Liberis filed a motion to set aside the default judgment against her.  In the court filing, Liberis claims she responded to Cash4Gold and explicity denied all allegations.  The motion also contains Liberis' answer.

Jurisdiction: 

Content Type: 

Subject Area: 

Threat Source: 

Blog Post

Frontera v. Embden

Date: 

12/15/2003

Threat Type: 

Lawsuit

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

Frederick Embden and others

Type of Party: 

Individual

Type of Party: 

Individual

Court Type: 

State

Court Name: 

New York Supreme Court, Dutchess County

Case Number: 

002854/2003

Verdict or Settlement Amount: 

$0.00

Legal Counsel: 

Caltagirone & Coleman

Publication Medium: 

Forum

Status: 

Concluded

Disposition: 

Settled (total)

Description: 

Details on this lawsuit are sparse, but it seems that a group of politically active people in Newburgh, N.Y. sued the creator and webmaster of the former forum section of the city's former official website, http://www.newburgh-ny.com (now redesigned and relocated).  Although the site was labelled and promoted as the city's official site, it was owned and maintainted by Frederick R. Embden.

The suit apparently stemmed from comments posted in the site's forums that accused the plaintiffs of various improprieties. The lawsuit appears to be part of long, ongoing dispute between factions of the city's civic community. A taste of vitriol and some (hyperbolic) discussion of the lawsuit in available in this discussion thread on the voy.com bulletin board site.

Trial was originally scheduled for September 2008, then postponed to August 2009.  But the parties reached a settlement on Aug. 28, 2009, when the trial was set to begin.

Jurisdiction: 

Content Type: 

Subject Area: 

Video Professor v. Informercial Consumer Awareness

Date: 

05/03/2009

Threat Type: 

Lawsuit

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

Dean Graziosi; Ryan Patten; Michael Savage; Edward Johnson; The Tax Club, Inc.; Infomercial Consumer Awareness, Inc.; Justin Leonard; Leonard Fitness, Inc.

Type of Party: 

Organization

Type of Party: 

Individual
Organization

Court Type: 

Federal

Court Name: 

United States District Court for the District of Colorado

Case Number: 

1:09-cv-01025-RPM

Legal Counsel: 

Stanford B. Owen and Gregory E. Goldberg (for Graziosi); Scott T. Ashby (for Patton); Jersey M. Green (for Savage); Randall H. Miller (for Informercial Consumer Awareness); Barry Douglas Roseman and Paul A. Levy (for Leonard)

Publication Medium: 

Website

Relevant Documents: 

Status: 

Pending

Disposition: 

Settled (partial)

Description: 

Video Professor, a computer instruction software company, filed a lawsuit against the owners of Infomercialscams.com, a website which hosts anonymous reviews of infomercial products, and several related individuals asserting claims that the owners of Infomercialscams.com used the threat of negative consumer ratings to extort the company. 

Video Professor's ten-count complaint alleged that Informercial Consumer Awareness, the corporation which runs Infomercialscams.com, used Video Professor's trademarks in its metadata, such that any web search for the company would return a listing for Informercialscams.com and potentially negative consumer reviews. Compl. ¶ 47. According to the complaint, Infomercial Consumer Awareness allegedly offered Video Professor the opportunity to "delist" negative reviews of its product and to boost its rating on the site in exchange for a yearly payment of approximately $300,000.  Compl. ¶ 67.

Video Professor argued that, through these actions, Informercial Commercial Awareness and the associated individuals violated the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act (RICO) and misused the protections of the Communications Decency Act Section 230. Video Professor also filed for a preliminary injunction against Informercial Commercial Awareness. 

On July 8, 2009, Video Professor voluntarily dismissed the case against all defendants pursuant to an undisclosed settlement agreement. The Stipulated Notice of Dismissal as to Defendants Justin Leonard and Leonard Fitness, Inc. (the "Leonard Defendants") reserved to those Defendants the right to file a motion for attorneys' fees and sanctions pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 11. 

On July 22, 2009, the Leonard Defendants filed the motion for attorneys' fees and sanctions, asserting that Video Professor lacked any evidentiary support for its claims against those defendants.  Specifically, the Leonard Defendants claimed that Section 230 immunized them from liability for the allegedly defamatory postings, and that Video Professor's attempts to plead around Section 230 by asserting claims for extortion were insufficient as to the Leonard Defendants because Leonard had sold the web site in May 2008, before the alleged extortion attempts occurred.

The Leonard Defendants' motion for attorneys' fees and sactions is still pending.

Jurisdiction: 

Content Type: 

Subject Area: 

CMLP Notes: 

Same plaintiff as Video Professor v. Justin Leonard and Video Professor v. Doe. Same defendant Leonard as in those threats as well.

8/3/009 - avm editing

Priority: 

1-High

Devenyns v. Albero

Date: 

07/24/2009

Threat Type: 

Lawsuit

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

Joseph Albero

Type of Party: 

Individual

Type of Party: 

Individual

Court Type: 

State

Court Name: 

Circuit Court of Wicomico County

Publication Medium: 

Blog

Status: 

Concluded

Disposition: 

Dismissed (total)

Description: 

A Maryland prison director filed a defamation lawsuit against Maryland political blogger Joseph Albero for allowing an allegedly defamatory user comment to appear on his website. Douglas Devenyns claims an anonymous commenter on Albero's Salisbury News blog falsely stated he was a "sexual predator" who shortened female inmates sentences in exchange for sex, according to The Daily Times.

According to Delmarva Dealings, the suit seeks $150,000 in damages. The complaint tries to get around Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act by arguing that Albero is liable for the comment because he determines which comments to publish and whether he will edit them first.

Update:

9/10/2009 - Albero filed a motion to dismiss under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.  He argues that the act protects third parties even if they perform some editorial functions.  

11/30/2009 - The court granted Albero's motion for summary judgment.

Jurisdiction: 

Content Type: 

Subject Area: 

CMLP Notes: 

likely section 230 case

CMF - 8/5/09

Priority: 

1-High

Doe v. Dirty World Entertainment

Date: 

05/06/2009

Threat Type: 

Lawsuit

Party Receiving Legal Threat: 

Dirty World Entertainment; Hooman Karamian, d/b/a Nik Richie

Type of Party: 

Individual

Type of Party: 

Individual
Organization

Court Type: 

State

Legal Counsel: 

David Gingras

Publication Medium: 

Website

Status: 

Pending

Description: 

An anonymous Texas woman has filed suit in state court against the operator of The Dirty, self-described as the "first and most famous reality gossip blog," for allegedly lending credence to a third-party comment on the site that showed her picture and accused her of having herpes. According to True/Slant, the suit alleges the third-party poster asked the blog's founder, Hooman Karamian, if he would still sleep with the woman — to which Karamian allegedly replied, "No, I don't want to get infected."

According to the ABA Journal, the suit also names as a defendant Dirty World Entertainment, the Arizona-based owner of the website. The ABA Journal also reports that the plaintiff will argue the defendants should not be protected by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act because Karamian allegedly made comments that validated the third-party post. 

Jurisdiction: 

Content Type: 

Subject Area: 

CMLP Notes: 

7/26/09- AVM- 230 case, nothing on wl

7/31/09 - CMF updated

Priority: 

1-High

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