Court Opinion

ID: 9516679
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-06 23:48:46.344251+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:38:36.999205
License: Public Domain

KELLY, Judge,
concurring:
I concur in the result. The characterization of appellant as a “widow robber” was a derogatory rhetorical hyperbole; it was also an opinion based upon disclosed facts. As such it was not actionable. See Dougherty v. Boyertown Times, *184377 Pa.Super. 462, 476-80, 547 A.2d 778, 785-86 (1988). While I do not find a “hot news” exception embraced in Curran v. Philadelphia Newspapers, 376 Pa.Super. 508, 546 A.2d 639 (1988). I likewise agree with the majority that whether or not such an exception might be recognized in an appropriate case it could not reasonably apply here. I further agree wholeheartedly that there appears a genuine issue of fact from which a jury could reasonably find actual malice with regard to the patently defamatory helicopter report.1

. The assertions by the reporter and the publisher that they did not understand the import of a report that an incumbent mining union official was being transported by coal company helicopter for campaign appearance is specious. It does nothing to advance their legal position, though it does much to undermine their general credibility.