Opinion ID: 2449383
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: was the article libelous?

Text: Libel is the publication of a written, defamatory, and unprivileged statement. Writing and publication are conceded here. The writing is defamatory if it tends to (1) bring a person into public hatred, contempt or ridicule; (2) cause him to be shunned or avoided; or, (3) injure him in his business or occupation. It is an elementary principle of the law of libel that the defamatory matter complained of should be construed as a whole. Smith v. Pure Oil Co., 278 Ky. 430, 128 S.W.2d 931 (1939); Restatement (Second) of Torts, Sec. 563, comment d (1976). The alleged defamatory words must be measured by their natural and probable effect on the mind of the average lay reader and not be subjected to the critical analysis of the legal mind. Digest Publishing Company v. Perry Publishing Co., Ky., 284 S.W.2d 832 (1955). We must, therefore, analyze the article in its entirety and determine if its gist or sting is defamatory. The gist of the article is that the reporters became interested in McCall's conduct while they were interviewing Frazier on another matter. She alleged, in the first interview, that McCall had offered to fix her case for $10,000. Frazier signed an affidavit to the effect that McCall for said fee would guarantee that she would walk in the courtroom and turn around and walk back out. A witness corroborated that McCall had said this. The interview and the affidavits relating to an alleged fix were the sparks that ignited the investigation and the subsequent publication of the article. At the instance of the two reporters, Frazier agreed to make an appointment with McCall, and to carry a concealed tape recorder. She was told only one specific question to ask: Can't this case be handled in the regular way for $1,500, without a payoff, or does it have to take $10,000 to keep me out of jail? The plan was that if the answer given by McCall to that question (and presumably any other incriminating statement he made) constituted an attempt to bribe a judge, [2] the newspaper would provide the money. Following the meeting between McCall and Frazier, the Times analyzed the transcript of their conversation and found no indication of any `fix'. In spite of this conclusion, the Times decided to publish a detailed description of the entire transaction. The story appeared on page one and included the allegations made by Frazier and her witness that McCall had offered to fix the case or bribe a judge. These allegations were published, in spite of the fact that the newspaper knew  and admitted it knew  that there was no evidence of any such crime on the part of McCall. What we have is a situation where the newspaper says to the reader, we don't find any evidence of a crime on the part of McCall, but we heard some contrary stories and we are going to repeat them anyway. Contrary to the statement of respondents' counsel that there were only one or two references to an alleged illegal act of McCall in the article, we have found references in nine paragraphs in the article which use the words fix, illegally, improper offers, possible mishandling, fix or bribe, payoff, and illegal way. All these terms refer to the allegations of McCall's alleged misconduct. In addition, the article spends a great deal of time to show that a contingent fee, allegedly suggested by McCall in a criminal case, may be a serious violation of the canons of legal ethics. The article unquestionably paints a sordid picture of McCall as an attorney. The repeated use of the words fix, bribe, etc., with reference to McCall, are so overwhelming that a lay person would, we believe, inevitably conclude that McCall did solicit a high legal fee for the purpose of fixing a case or bribing a judge. We conclude that the article in question is defamatory as a matter of law.