Opinion ID: 406269
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Summary Judgment on Defamation Claim.

Text: 10 Halsell amended his original complaint to include a claim of defamation against Kimberly-Clark and Wayne Cheng, a Kimtech design engineer. The amended complaint alleged that Cheng published a false and defamatory memorandum about Halsell. Cheng had written the memorandum to Al Wendahl, manager of Kimberly-Clark's pulp and paper mill activities, regarding problems with Halsell on the Orizaba project. The memorandum remained in Wendahl's personal files until produced in this litigation. 11 The district court dismissed the claim against Mr. Cheng individually, for lack of personal jurisdiction. Subsequently, the district court granted Kimberly-Clark partial summary judgment on the defamation issue because no publication of the allegedly defamatory statements had occurred. 12 In terms of Kimberly-Clark's liability, the alleged publication was from Kimberly-Clark to Kimberly-Clark when the memorandum travelled from one Kimberly-Clark employee to another. All this amounts to is the corporation, through its agents, talking to itself. Until the defamatory statement is communicated outside the corporate sphere or internal organization, it has not been published. (Halsell v. Kimberly-Clark Corp., 518 F.Supp. 694, No. L.R. 76-C-208 (June 24, 1981) (order) (citations omitted).) 13 An action for defamation requires publication of the allegedly defamatory matter to one other than the defamed person. The Wisconsin Supreme Court 4 has held that communications between officers of a corporation or between different branches of the same corporation, in the course of corporate business, do not constitute publications to third persons. See Lehner v. Associated Press, 215 Wis. 254, 254 N.W. 664, 666 (1934); Flynn v. Reinke, 199 Wis. 124, 225 N.W. 742, 744 (Wis.1929). Because the essential element of publication was lacking in this case, the district court correctly granted partial summary judgment to Kimberly-Clark on the issue of defamation. 14