Gawker's Anti-SLAPP Victory Could Be Good For The Web - But Judge Refuses To Publish The Ruling
from the step-up,-california dept
A few months ago, Eric Goldman wrote about a good ruling by a California court to knock out a bogus defamation claim against blog site Gawker. There were a few interesting elements to the ruling, including that it used California's anti-SLAPP law, and that it was willing to look at the context of the use of certain words like "scam." But, most importantly, it noted the fact that the Gawker piece included numerous links/citations to sources, which meant that anyone could dig deeper to understand the details themselves.The problem with the ruling is that, as good as it was, the court decided to issue it as an "unpublished" ruling, meaning that it has limited use as a precedent elsewhere. Goldman then sought to have the court revisit that decision and, instead, to fully publish the decision. Unfortunately, in a one line ruling, the court has now rejected that request (pdf):
The request for an order directing publication of the opinion in the above-entitled appeal is denied.That's it. End of story. No explanation. No publication. That's really kind of ridiculous. What is the court afraid of? It made the ruling. Why not stand behind it, and make it easier for similar bogus cases to be quickly shot down by the courts?
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Filed Under: anti-slapp, california, defamation, precedents
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What is the court afraid of?
“No state shall ... deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”
A court following precedent proclaims the idea that cases of equal circumstances shall be ruled by equal law. That the status of the parties —rich, poor, noble, peasant— shall be subordinate to the facts of justice.
That California court may not like that idea.
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What does it mean to 'Publish'
What does is mean for a ruling to be "Published"? And aren't ALL rulings "Published"? If not, why not? What's the theory?
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Re: What does it mean to 'Publish'
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Re: Re: Re: What does it mean to 'Publish'
The three judge panel of the Court of Appeals, in their August 31, 2012 denial memorandum, stated that their “August 10, 2012 opinion [did] not meet the standard for publication as set forth in rule 8.1105(c) of the California Rules of Court.”
You may compare Rule 8.1105(c) with the reasons which Mr Goldman supplied in his request.
As Mr Masnick points out above, the California Supreme Court, en banc, did not provide its reasons for denial.
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What abotu Gawker?
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Re: What abotu Gawker?
I don't usually get finicky about “can” vs “may”...
But in this particular case, why don't you ask Gawker what they can or can't do? I don't know what their capabilities are.
Eric Goldman's Technology & Marketing Law blog has a link to the California Court of Appeal's opinion in Redmond v Gawker Media. And Eric Goldman's Techdirt post (very first link above!) contains an embedded Docstoc copy of the opinion.
So maybe you tell me? Can Gawker themselves publish?
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Sadly, this stuff happens
However, Redmond v. Gawker wasn't a routine appeal, and it did discuss new issues of law. So the opinion should have been published, and I suggested to Eric that he request publication. Why was the request unsuccessful then? I think the Justices believed that Gawker should win, so they said so, but they didn't want to stick their neck out with a published opinion that would establish precedent. Sometimes those cases happen, and we unfortunately get decisions that are worthy of being published, but aren't.
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