Did appellees conclusively prove the official proceeding privilege? A no-evidence summary judgment should be reversed if the evidence is sufficient for reasonable and fair-minded jurors to differ in their conclusions. Bentley, 94 S.W.3d at 591. Am. The Tatums sued both appellees for libel and libel per se. at 60. Texas Supreme Court dismisses defamation lawsuit against The Dallas Morning News John and Mary Ann Tatum, whose 17-year-old son shot himself, sued The News in 2011 alleging that a. 051401318CV. 73.005(a) (truth is a defense to a libel action); see also Neely, 418 S.W.3d at 62 (mentioning the defense of truth and citing 73.005); Randall's Food Mkts., Inc. v. Johnson, 891 S.W.2d 640, 646 (Tex.1995) (In suits brought by private individuals, truth is an affirmative defense to slander.) (footnote omitted). John Tatum and Mary Ann Tatum, Appellants v. The Dallas Morning News, Inc. and Steve Blow, Appellees. On appeal, appellees argue only that the affidavits are too speculative. Trusts & Estates The next seven paragraphs describe two recent occurrences meant to illustrate Blow's pointthe events surrounding the deaths of Ted Pillsbury and Paul Tatum. at 1019. Did appellees establish as a matter of law that the column is privileged as a fair account of official proceedings or as a fair comment on a matter of public concern? We conclude that there was more than a scintilla of evidence showing more than a mere failure to conduct a reasonable investigation. Tobacco Co. v. Grinnell, 951 S.W.2d 420, 425 (Tex.1997). a. News | Dallas Morning News 7848 News In this Section: Public Safety Weather Politics Crime Transportation Man accused of stealing earthquake donations from Flower Mound mosque arrested. In cases not covered by these mandates, Texas has generally made truth an affirmative defense to defamation. Accordingly, the court held that the columns were nonactionable opinions. Defamation has two forms: slander and libel. Appellees, however, do not contend that the Tatums are public officials or general-purpose public figures. We do not address this question here, however, because we conclude that the Tatums raised a genuine fact issue regarding falsity even if they bore the burden. (3)the alleged defamation must be germane to the plaintiff's participation in the controversy. The Tatums argue that an accusation of deception is verifiable and therefore actionable, while appellees argue that it is not. See Tex. For the reasons discussed below, we conclude that their cases are distinguishable or otherwise unpersuasive. (the undisclosed information must be about the goods or services being rendered). Is there evidence that the column's gist was false? Benjamin has a Bachelors in philosophy and a Master's in humanities. My column told them nothing they didn't already know. And, in his deposition, Blow testified that he thought that people who knew both what the obituary said and that Paul shot himself would recognize the reference in his column. Bentley, 94 S.W.3d at 591; see also N.Y. Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 27980 (1964). Id. Do you think that might be important for parents to understand? In light of Milkovich, Neely, and Bentley, we conclude that the column's gist that the Tatums were deceptive when they wrote Paul's obituary is sufficiently verifiable to be actionable in defamation. Thus, if the column's false gistthat the Tatums wrote Paul's obituary with the intent to deceiveis more damaging to the Tatums' reputations than a true statement would have been, then the gist is not substantially true. The gist also implies that the explanation the Tatums gave for the cause of Paul's death was false and that Paul committed suicide because of remorse rather than because of injuries suffered in the auto accident. One expert explained the severity of Paul's auto accident, and the other opined that Paul committed suicide because of a brain injury sustained in that accident. Id. Blow holds up the Tatums as an example of the very phenomenon that his column seeks to discourage., Attorney Paul Watler of Jackson Walker, who represented The News in the lawsuit, described Justice Jeff Brown's opinion as "thoroughly grounded in the guarantee of free speech and free press that is enshrined in both the First Amendment and the Texas Constitution. The column describes Paul's obituary and death immediately after it describes the fabricated cause of death that was advanced after Ted Pillsbury's suicide. In this libel-by-implication case, a column written by Steve Blow and published by The Dallas Morning News (collectively, Petitioners) was reasonably capable of meaning that John and Mary Ann Tatum acted deceptively and that the accusation of deception was reasonably capable of defaming the Tatums. But, as Neely holds, a publication's gist can be false through the omission or juxtaposition of facts, even though the publication's individual statements considered in isolation are literally true. The column, captioned Shrouding suicide leaves its danger unaddressed, criticized people who are dishonest about loved ones' suicides. Appellees' contrary argument fails on the first prong we referenced abovethe existence of a public controversy for the Tatums to participate in. It does not mention those proceedings, nor does it report any statements or findings made in the course of those proceedings. Next, specifically as to Paul's death, Blow wrote that the paid obituary said Paul died as a result of injuries sustained in an automobile accident, but Paul's death turned out to have been a suicide. Blow continued, There was a car crash, all right, but death came from a self-inflicted gunshot wound in a time of remorse afterward. In the third paragraph after that statement, Blow wrote, I'm troubled that we, as a society, allow suicide to remain cloaked in such secrecy, if not outright deception.. In Tatum v. The Dallas Morning News, Inc., No. Examples of defamation per se include (i) accusing someone of a crime, (ii) accusing someone of having a foul or loathsome disease, (iii) accusing someone of serious sexual misconduct, and (iv) disparaging another's fitness to conduct his or her business or trade. at 58384. But the court went on to hold that "to the extent that the column states that the Tatums acted deceptively, it is true." West sued for defamation, he lost the case on summary judgment, and the case came before the Utah Supreme Court. Newspapers, Inc. v. Hepps, 475 U.S. 767, 77576 (1986); see also Turner, 38 S.W.3d at 116; Klentzman v. Brady, 456 S.W.3d 239, 26364 (Tex.App.Houston [1st Dist.] Gaming Law Consumer Law Am. filed). Prac. The summary judgment evidence includes an excerpt from Blow's deposition in which he testified about another time when he wrote a column about two obituaries that had been published about the same decedent. denied) (objection that opinions are speculative can be raised for the first time on appeal). Neely, 418 S.W.3d at 63. Appellees asserted several summary judgment grounds. Did you know that almost twice as many people die each year from suicide as from homicide? We therefore do not address whether those categories apply here. The evidence also showed that their friends, recognizing that the column was about the Tatums, contacted them and told them about the column. The official Dallas Morning News Twitter account. Appellees argue that a public controversy existed over the official cause of Paul's death. In re Lipsky, 460 S.W.3d 579, 593 (Tex.2015) (orig.proceeding). His testimony demonstrates his training and expertise in the field of accident reconstruction. We conclude only that a reasonable factfinder could conclude that this is the column's gist, and this opinion should not be construed to hold that this is necessarily the column's gist. Additionally, the summary judgment evidence established that the Tatums were out of town the day the column was published. Slander is an oral defamation. See Waste Mgmt. 497 U.S. at 1921. Appellants John and Mary Ann Tatum sued appellees Steve Blow and The Dallas Morning News (DMN) for libel regarding a column that Blow wrote and DMN published one month after the Tatums' son Paul committed suicide. But, here he did not attempt to contact the Tatums before publishing the column at issue in this case. Finally, appellees cite West v. Thomson Newspapers, 872 P.2d 999 (Utah 1994). The actual column, however, can be read to allow and encourage the reader to conclude that the Tatums had no basis for attributing Paul's death to injuries sustained in the earlier car crash and that they wanted to deceive the obituary's readers about the cause of Paul's death, perhaps to conceal their own failure to save his life through an intervention. That question remains to be decided by the factfinder. Id. Turner, 38 S.W.3d at 115. Steve Blow is a columnist for The Dallas Morning News. Become a business insider with the latest news. There was also evidence from which a reasonable jury could find that a proper investigation would have revealed that the Tatums had a good faith belief that Paul's death was in fact caused by injuries sustained in a car accident. at 894. In our analysis of this question, we focus on DMN's second no-evidence ground and particularly the first requirement of 17.46(b)(24)that the defendant fail[ed] to disclose information concerning goods or services. Id. Legal Ethics Appellees also argue that there is no evidence to support the Tatums' theory that a brain injury made Paul suicidal. Id. dallas morning news v tatum oyezmedical emergency tabletop exercise. This is some evidence of actual malice. Heritage Capital, 436 S.W.3d at 875. Professional Malpractice & Ethics See Neely, 418 S.W.3d at 72. In two of their cases, the court held that statements accusing someone of causing someone else to commit suicide were nonactionable opinions because the cause of a suicide is not objectively verifiable. The Tatums' first appellate issue argues that the trial court erred by granting summary judgment on their libel claims. Mack Trucks, Inc. v. Tamez, 206 S.W.3d 572, 582 (Tex.2006). c.Did the Tatums raise a genuine fact issue as to negligence and actual malice? To the extent a negligence standard applies, there was no evidence of negligence. Sign up for our free summaries and get the latest delivered directly to you. In addition to their libel claims, the Tatums also asserted DTPA claims against DMN. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. There was no evidence DMN committed a false, misleading, or deceptive act listed in 17.46(b), or that the Tatums relied on any complained of act. We determine substantial truth by assessing the publication's gist. See id. THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS, INC. AND STEVE BLOW v. JOHN TATUM AND MARY ANN TATUM Oral argument was held on January 10, 2018. In May 2010, Paul was a seventeen-year-old high school student. He made his way home from the accident scene and began drinking champagne. They state that several paragraphs separate the column's description of Paul's suicide from its discussion of mental illness. Id. Zoning, Planning & Land Use. App.Dallas Dec. 30, 2015, pet. 1992, writ dism'd w.o.j.) Election Law We are unpersuaded. walkers gluten free shortbread / April 12, 2022 . at 6364. That decision, which backed the Tatums defamation claims, said readers could construe the column to suggest that Paul suffered from mental illness.. Although there is evidence that people in Paul's high school community were discussing his death generally, and that unspecified others in north Dallas were also discussing it before the column was published, there is no evidence that the cause or manner of Paul's death affected anyone other than the Tatums. 12, 2007, pet. We agree with the Tatums' second argument and thus do not address their first. at 62; McIlvain v. Jacobs, 794 S.W.2d 14, 15 (Tex.1990). In short, there must first be a controversy before it can be a public one. DMN asserted the following traditional summary judgment grounds against the Tatums' DTPA claims: DMN did not commit a false, misleading, or deceptive act that the Tatums relied on. This opinion should not be construed to hold that the column necessarily defamed the Tatums. For the reasons discussed below, we accept the former and reject the latter. D Magazine Partners, 2015 WL 5156908, at *7. a. In that regard, the statement must point to the plaintiff and to no one else. Appellees negated actual malice, defeating the Tatums' libel claims entirely if they are limited-purpose public figures and defeating their exemplary damage claims if they are private figures. Think of how much more attention we pay to the latter. B. We construe an allegedly defamatory publication as a whole in light of the surrounding circumstances and based on how a person of ordinary intelligence would perceive it. We have already concluded that a reasonable reader could conclude that the column presents a false gist about the Tatums. endstream
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Appellees make a threshold argument that the Tatums must satisfy the standard for libel per se because they did not plead or prove libel per quod or special damages. Id. We do not consider the defamatory statement itself in determining whether the plaintiff is a public figure. The court noted that the defendant had repeatedly stated that his accusations of corruption were based on objective, provable facts and on evidence that he had seen. The column's headline and opening sentence announce that deception and secrecy are the column's topics. at 6768. That appeal is also being decided today, John Tatum and Mary Ann Tatum v. Julie Hersh, No. More specifically, the column's first four paragraphs state Blow's opinion that people generally consider a death by suicide worthy of deception and mention honesty and being open about other causes of death. Id. The column was privileged as a fair, true, and impartial account of official proceedings. There was a page break in the middle of the column, and a slightly different headline appeared over the remainder of the column when it resumed on another page: Shrouding suicide in secrecy leaves its danger unaddressed. The column, with emphasis added, stated as follows: So I guess we're down to just one form of death still considered worthy of deception. Communications Law at 47. We next ask whether there was evidence that the column's gist was false. More recently, a paid obituary in this newspaper reported that a popular local high school student died as a result of injuries sustained in an automobile accident.. The Tatums' response relied on the following evidence: One, John Tatum testified by affidavit that his friend Lee Simpson called to inform him about the column the day it was published. Similarly, although there is evidence that the Tatums disagreed with the manner of death finding of suicide on Paul's death certificate and tried to persuade the medical examiner to change it, there is no evidence that the outcome of this alleged controversy affected anyone except the Tatums. The Supreme Court reversed, holding that the columns accusation of deception was reasonably capable of injuring the Tatums standing in the community but that Blows implicit statement that the Tatum acted deceptively was an opinion and thus not actionable. 8. About three months later, they filed an amended traditional and no-evidence summary judgment motion. Grief Support. at *1314. 418 S.W.3d at 64. We construe an allegedly defamatory publication as a whole, in light of the surrounding circumstances, based on how a person of ordinary intelligence would perceive it. Are the column's statements about the Tatums nonactionable opinions? Anderton v. Cawley, 378 S.W.3d 38, 46 (Tex.App.Dallas 2012, no pet.). Posted By : / chsaa basketball rule book /; Under :international cultureinternational culture They also produced evidence from which a reasonable jury could find that (i) Blow misrepresented his investigation and sources of information and (ii) Blow had some motive not to probe into the column's truth regarding the Tatums and the obituary. We conclude that summary judgment was proper as to the Tatums' DTPA claims but not as to their libel claims. As explained above, a false gist is substantially true and nonactionable if it is no more damaging to the plaintiff's reputation than a truthful publication would have been. When art expert Ted Pillsbury died in March, his company said he suffered an apparent heart attack on a country road in Kaufman County. 94 S.W.3d at 583. Accordingly, the Tatums submitted enough evidence to raise a genuine fact issue regarding whether they believed what they said in the obituary was true, did not intend to mislead or deceive anyone, and did not believe Paul suffered from mental illness. Appellees also direct us to Haynes v. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 8 F.3d 1222 (7th Cir.1993). at *4. We agree with the Tatums on all three points. The test here is whether the defamatory statement is verifiable as false. A statement does not have to refer to the plaintiff by name, however, if people who know and are acquainted with the plaintiff reasonably understand from reading the statement that it referred to the plaintiff. Main, 348 S.W.3d at 395; see also Houseman v. Publicaciones Paso del Norte, S.A., 242 S.W.3d 518, 525 (Tex.App.El Paso 2007, no pet.) 73.002(b)(2). Yet we're nearly blind to the greater threat of self-inflicted violence. Government Contracts Did the Tatums raise a genuine fact issue that appellees acted with the necessary degree of culpability? The Tatums argue that [t]he false gist of the Column is that [they] dishonestly characterized their son's death in the Obituary as a means to shroud his suicide in secrecy. The first question is whether an ordinarily intelligent person could construe the column as conveying that gist. Through honesty, she's trying to erase some of the shame and stigma that compounds and prolongs mental illness. The trial court granted summary judgment for Petitioners. In that case, Dr. Neely was disciplined for self-prescribing medications, but a news broadcast about him could reasonably have been understood to report that he was actually disciplined for operating on patients while using dangerous drugs or controlled substances. Arbitration & Mediation Id. 0
And they argue that this gist is false because they submitted evidence that they believed in good faith that Paul committed suicide because he suffered a brain injury in the car accident that in turn induced his suicidal thoughts. Construction Law Appellees won a take-nothing summary judgment. Thus, the column does not qualify for the official proceeding privilege. Ironically, the first person I knew to die of AIDS was said to have cancer. at 62 (In this defamation suit involving two physicians, we clarify a longstanding distinction between defamation and defamation per se). Neely's substantial truth analysis is instructive. See Neely, 418 S.W.3d at 63. Select your device from the three options below: Smartphone or Tablet Browser Desktop or Laptop Download the free iPad App Id. at 571; see also Einhorn v. LaChance, 823 S.W.2d 405, 411 (Tex.App.Houston [1st Dist.] Employment Law The Dallas Morning News Homepage. Here, the column did not mention Paul or the Tatums by name. Copyright 2023, Thomson Reuters. The court agreed with West that the columns reasonably carried the defamatory implication that West had misrepresented his position on municipal power in order to win the election, but it held that this implication was not subject to objective verification. Landlord - Tenant Again, a statement is defamatory if it tends to (i) injure the subject's reputation, (ii) expose him to public hatred, contempt, ridicule, or financial injury, or (iii) impeach his honesty, integrity, or virtue. Appellees further argue that the column does not omit or juxtapose facts in such a way as to make its gist false. denied) (mem.op.) Appellees argue that the column is a fair comment on a matter of public concern, specifically society's tendency to avoid open discussion of suicide and how that leaves its dangers underestimated. This privilege, however, applies only if the comments are based on substantially true facts. Transportation Law Two, John Tatum also testified that his minister called him about the column as well. Appellees, however, cite several cases from other jurisdictions to support their argument that the column's gist is an unverifiable opinion. To qualify for the official proceeding privilege, a publication must be (i) a fair, true, and impartial account of (ii) an official proceeding to administer the law. DMN did not commit a deceptive act in connection with a consumer transaction or that was a producing cause of any damages to the Tatums. Add . Had he investigated further and learned facts suggesting that the Tatums had no intent to deceive, this would have undercut the whole thrust of the column, which began with a reference to deception and ended with a call for honesty. The 2010 column, Shrouding suicide leaves its danger unaddressed, urged the public to talk more openly about suicide. Plaintiffs sued Defendant for intentional infliction of emotional distress (IIED), claiming that Defendant exploited the tragedy of their son's death by encouraging the criticism of their son's obituary. Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the Tatums, we conclude that a reasonable person could find that people who knew the Tatums would reasonably understand that the column referred to the Tatums. The Court issued an opinion resolving the case on May 11, 2018. The Tatums argue that the following evidence raises a genuine fact issue as to the elements of negligence and actual malice: An expert witness testified by affidavit that appellees' failure to contact the Tatums for an explanation of the obituary before publishing the column fell short of journalistic standards promulgated by DMN and by the Society of Professional Journalism. To accuse someone of deception is to impeach his or her honesty and integrity. The trial court later lifted the stay and again rendered a take-nothing summary judgment against the Tatums. Dec 19, 2022 "Sooner or later someone is going to have to give this area credit for good coaching, good kids and good programs." The column's headline was Shrouding suicide leaves its danger unaddressed. (Emphasis added). Energy, Oil & Gas Law Although the Tatums' mental states when they wrote the obituary may not be susceptible of direct proof, we conclude that they are sufficiently verifiable through circumstantial evidence, such as the investigation into the possible causes for Paul's suicide that the Tatums undertook, to make the column's defamatory gist about them verifiable under Milkovich and Neely. filed), we noted that "[p]lacing the burden of proving truth or falsity is a complex . Founded in 1885, The Dallas Morning is North Texas' largest news team. They argue that the column's gist includes an assertion that they falsely ascribed Paul's death to injuries sustained in an automobile accident with the intent to mislead and deceive readers and to cover up his suicide. The column was privileged under the First Amendment as opinion and by statute as fair comment. Issue One: Did the trial court err by dismissing the Tatums' libel claims? To the contrary, the column's tone is generally sober, and it purports to be grounded in factual details such as the circumstances of Pillsbury's and Paul's deaths, data about the prevalence of suicide among young people, and Julie Hersh's public efforts to reduce the shame and stigma surrounding mental illness. Morbid curiosity, they call it apologetically. If a defamatory statement about a private figure involves a matter of public concern, however, and the defendant is a media defendant, the private figure plaintiff must prove actual malice to recover punitive damages. 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