Posted on 11/10/2007 9:23:11 AM PST by TheRealDBear
ST. LOUIS — A lewd scoreboard message at Busch Stadium has found its way into another arena: a court of law.
An Illinois teen is suing the Cardinals, claiming she was ostracized at school after a crude comment about her landed on a ballpark scoreboard. The message appeared through a program that allows fans to post text messages with their cell phones.
According to the suit, the teen was at a game with her high school in May 2006 when a female classmate sent a message saying the plaintiff "has an STD! Eww!"
The girl, then 16, is identified in the suit only by her initials, A.B. She never had a sexually transmitted disease, according to the suit. Advertisement
The suit was filed Wednesday in St. Louis Circuit Court. It claims the "shame and humiliation" she suffered forced her to stay out of school, take her final exams in a separate office, and seek psychological counseling. Almost all of her friends were at the game, the suit says, and boys avoided her afterward.
The suit claims the teen "had thoughts of injuring herself," forcing her mother to miss work to care for her.
On Thursday, the Cardinals blamed the incident on a high school rivalry.
"We understand that this was an unfortunate prank played on this young woman by one of her own classmates," said Dan Nelson, an attorney representing the team. "We are, frankly, surprised that the matter has even elevated to this level."
The suit accuses the Cardinals of negligence in allowing a defamatory statement to be published. The girl is seeking damages "in excess of $25,000," plus legal fees.
(Excerpt) Read more at stltoday.com ...
Because the people who do the damage don’t have deep pockets. Note mommy is suing the Cardinals. Mommy is not equiping her little flower to cope with the real world, only the victimhood world.
Oopsie. AB had a STUD! A mispelling by a jealous “friend”!
So what? But for the scoreboard . . . .
Bingo.
or the wall at school, or in the cafeteria, or notes passed in class ... the Cardinals were certainly asking for trouble offering an un-moderated venue, but it would seem the girl was the target of her peers from before the Cardinals offered up their scoreboard as a forum. $25K might help her “self-esteem” but who will she sue the next time the clique makes fun of her?
Well, in those more limited situations, she’d have a harder time proving damages. The Cards should’ve had someone monitoring the system. The Cards did not. Bad for the Cards.
Oooops. Eyes read Cards but the mind read Reds.
Gettin’ old ain’t always fun...but I do tend to forget quickly.
The Cardinals definitely owe her an apology. It is, however, the author of the message that owes her for damages.
“The message appeared through a program that allows fans to post text messages with their cell phones.”
Who was the genius who came up with that?
I'm curious as to what law school would teach you that interpretation of defamation.
what would be interesting is to see how,and what, the court decides whether a text message is libel or slander.
In many jursidictions damage to reputation is presumed in libel, but must be proven in slander cases. HOWEVER, a curious exception to that is when the slander involves a STD, then the slander is established per se (probably not everywhere, though).
From a legal perspective this has the makings of a very interesting case.
What exactly are you disputing? ...That falsely telling people someone else has an STD is defamatory? ...Or what an author is? ...Or whether a broadcast message message is slander or libel? ...Or whether an objective truth has the same level of presumption as a subjective one? All of that? None of that?
In any case, quite aside from "law school", I was speaking morally. I don't think I implied anything else.
As to whether it is slander or libel, that is one of the parts of this that is legally interesting. the message was typed, but on a cell phone. So it is possible that the communication could be considered either libel or slander. But since the allegation was regarding her being infected with an STD, in most jurisdictions the elements required to prove one or the other would be the same. It will be merely interesting to see how the court view's the matter.
I'm assuming that she'll get some money out of the Cards...and they were stupid for not putting a filtering mechanism in place. That said, the worst they did morally is be naively trusting. Being an electronic billboard, that's not exactly "repeating" defamatory language in any social sense.
Classic case of libel per se. And you sue the one that published it - they have the right defendant.
No, it is the publisher that is liable.
See the California codification of the common law:
"Libel is a false and unprivileged publication by writing, printing, picture, effigy, or other fixed representation to the eye, which exposes any person to hatred, contempt, ridicule, or obloquy, or which causes him to be shunned or avoided, or which has a tendency to injure him in his occupation.- " http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=civ&group=00001-01000&file=43-53
Shouldn’t the Cardinals have someone proof reading what goes up there? Wouldn’t a prudent host of such a venue prepare for such postings by having someone to edit? I think the venue owner (the Cardinals) dropped the ball on this one...what of the cell phone company...it was a promotion of their’s as well?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.