OT: Forum legalish question

[Jeff Kinz]

On Fri, Mar 03, 2006 at 09:18:14PM -0500, Travis Roy wrote:

> I found out that he 
> managed to get the other board members to approve a retainer to the 
> district lawyer to sue me and other board members for slander and libel.

He wants the town to subsidize his suing of you and other board
members?  Wow.

Stolen from Wikipedia: 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slander
"According to the American and English Encyclopedia of Law, a libel is a
malicious defamation expressed either by writing or printing or by
signs, pictures, effigies or the like; tending to blacken the memory of
one who is dead, or to impeach the honesty, integrity, virtue or
reputation, or to publish the natural or alleged defects of one who is
alive, thereby exposing him to public hatred, contempt, ridicule or
obloquy; or to cause him to be avoided or shunned or to injure him in
his office, business or occupation."

However, Political speech and Satire are both given a lot of protection
under American Law.

But Statements made with "malice" are not, (unless they are satire....)

But unbelievable statements bring no liability:

(Also Stolen from same above)
"In 1988, in Hustler Magazine v. Falwell, (485 U.S. 46), the Supreme
Court ruled that a parody ......  claiming Jerry Falwell had
engaged in an incestuous act with his mother in an outhouse, while
false, could not allow Falwell to win damages for emotional distress
because the statement was so obviously ridiculous that it was clearly
not true; an allegation believed by nobody, it was ruled, brought no
liability upon the author. The court thus overturned a lower court's
upholding of an award where the jury had decided against the claim of
libel but had awarded damages for emotional distress."

So unless "Joe" is willing to say, in court that he is such an "..."
that people in his own town would believe he is a dictator, or is 
willing to have secret police kill thousands of people, then 
He hasn't much to go on.  (This is one possible defense)

**JMO, IMNSHO, YMWV, IANAL, YANAL, MMINAL, YM

> I was just looking for opinion. I haven't gotten anything official from 
> him or his laywer yet. He's never even asked for any posts to be removed 
> or edited.

Trav, maybe you should run for board.  :-)


Final Note - Small town politics (and large as well), are rife with
abuse of power and unfair play.  That's part of the game apparently.

Unless a person like "joe" is opposed by equally aggressive and
knowledgeable persons they can often ignore process and procedures
(or add them) to insure they get the outcomes they desire.

I suggest you get advice from whatever older -exboard members you can
and be ready to play hardball.

One possible response is to apologize when actually presented with a
complaint.  That may be all it takes to put this issue to bed.
Only you know what you have said about this guy so no one else can
really know what the possible offenses are here.

(Unless you've related everything there really is above)


> 

-- 
Jeff Kinz, Emergent Research, Hudson, MA.
speech recognition software may have been used to mess up this e-mail


**
 JMO just my opinion
 YMWV your mileage WILL vary
 YANAL You are not a Lawyer
 MMINAL My mother is not a lawyer
 YM  Your Mama!