Opinion ID: 1691626
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: LibelPunitive Damages

Text: The award of punitive damages, however, is quite another matter. Ala.Code 1975, § 6-5-186, provides: Vindictive or punitive damages shall not be recovered in any action for libel on account of any publication unless (1) it shall be proved that the publication was made by the defendant with knowledge that the matter published was false, or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not, and (2) it shall be proved that five days before the commencement of the action the plaintiff shall have made written demand upon the defendant for a public retraction of the charge or matter published; and the defendant shall have failed or refused to publish within five days, in as prominent and public a place or manner as the charge or matter published occupied, a full and fair retraction of such charge or matter. (Emphasis added.) It is undisputed that the plaintiffs did not solicit a retraction, as required by § 6-5-186. Consequently, the punitive damages awarded by the jury in this case are authorized by Alabama law only if Chief Wilson's remarks are properly characterized as slander. I would hold that they are not. `Libel consists of the publication of defamatory matter by written or printed words, by its embodiment in physical form or by any other form of communication that has the potentially harmful qualities characteristic of written or printed words.' First Indep. Baptist Church of Arab v. Southerland, 373 So.2d 647, 649 (Ala.1979) (quoting Restatement (Second) of Torts § 568; emphasis in Southerland). Southerland held that statements made in tape-recorded sermons broadcast from a radio stationwere, if defamatory, libel rather than slander. 373 So.2d at 650. Consistent with that case is the view that [a] publication of a libel may be made by an oral communication that is intended to be, and is, reduced to writing ... or when a statement is given orally to a newspaper reporter and is published in the paper. Willis v. Perry, 677 P.2d 961, 963 (Colo.App. 1983) (quoting Restatement (Second) of Torts § 568 cmt. f (1977) (emphasis added)); see also Newton v. Family Federal Savings & Loan Ass'n, 48 Or.App. 373, 616 P.2d 1213 (1980). It would be anomalous and unjust to hold Chief Wilson liable for damages flowing from publications in forms which, if the action had been brought against the republishing media, would, by definition, be the basis of a cause of action for libelnot slanderbut, at the same time, deny him the benefit of § 6-5-186, to which the republishing media would be entitled. I consider Chief Wilson's statements, to the extent they are defamatory, different in no substantive respect from dictations made to a stenographer for written dissemination. See Restatement (Second) of Torts § 568 cmt. f (1977) ([O]ne who dictates to a stenographer a letter that defames a third person may become liable for libel on the basis of the oral communication when the stenographer takes it down, even though no other person sees it). I would hold that Chief Wilson's statements are subject to § 6-5-186, and, consequently, are not subject to the imposition of punitive damages. To the extent, therefore, that the majority opinion characterizes the defamation as slander and supports the imposition of punitive damages, I respectfully dissent. SHORES, J., concurs.