Opinion ID: 511771
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: is the tortious interference with business relations

Text: 65 CLAIM DUPLICATIVE OF THE SLANDER CLAIMS? 66 We next consider Sorensen's judgment against Nanavati for tortious interference with Sorensen's business relations. Nanavati argues that the tortious interference claim was entirely duplicative of the slander claims. He relies upon the Joint Final Pretrial Order, in which Sorensen explained that Nanavati had caused the interference by making repeated false allegations of discrimination, improper patient care, improper practices, and inadequate qualifications. Joint Final Pretrial Order, May 12, 1986, at 52. Sorensen responds that the interference claim was based on far more than the specific acts of slander which constituted the slander claim. Sorensen does not deny, however, that the entire tortious interference claim was based on allegedly false statements of fact. 67 We conclude that the judgment on Sorensen's tortious interference claim must be set aside. If Sorensen wished to include in the claim acts of false allegations beyond those in the slander claim, he had a duty to set those forth with particularity. New Jersey courts have emphasized that the defenses applicable to defamation claims retain their full status for tortious interference claims if such tortious interference claims are based on verbal conduct. See, e.g., Rainier's Dairies v. Raritan Valley Farms, Inc., 19 N.J. 552, 117 A.2d 889, 894-95 (1955); Middlesex Concrete Products v. Carteret Ind. Ass'n, 68 N.J.Super. 85, 172 A.2d 22 (App.Div.1961). Similarly, the United States Supreme Court recently indicated that the constitutional guarantees protecting speech against libel claims retain their full force regardless of the nature of the cause of action. Hustler Magazine v. Falwell, --- U.S. ----, 108 S.Ct. 876, 99 L.Ed.2d 41 (1988). If those privileges and constitutional protections are to have meaning, a plaintiff must be required to set forth allegedly actionable statements with particularity. See J.A. 146, 152-54 (district court's Memorandum Opinion dated 4/8/86 granting summary judgment in favor of Nanavati, partly because Sorensen failed to plead his defamation claim with specificity; grant of summary judgment later reconsidered to allow Sorensen to allege defamation claims arising out of May 11 article. J.A. at 190.). See, e.g., National Bowl-O-Mat Corp. v. Brunswick Corp., 264 F.Supp. 221 (D.N.J.1967). 68 Here, Sorensen set forth no actionable statements either in his pleading or in his proposed pretrial order beyond those set forth in the slander claim. We conclude that he thereby limited his tortious interference claim to the same statements he set out in his defamation claim. Cf. Bainhauer v. Manoukian, 215 N.J.Super. 9, 520 A.2d 1154, 1175 (App.Div.1987) (the malicious interference count ... is expressly predicated on precisely the same facts as are alleged in the defamation count. Proof or failure of proof of the operative facts of the defamation count would, therefore, completely comprehend the malicious interference cause.) 13 Our rejection of liability for those statements therefore applies also to the tortious interference claim, and the judgment in favor of Sorensen on that claim therefore must be reversed. 14 Any other result would impermissibly allow Sorensen to circumvent the statute of limitations and, more importantly, the constitutional protections for defamation.