Court Opinion

ID: 9777993
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 20:29:40.699185+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:33:02.686362
License: Public Domain

BLACKMAR, Judge,
concurring.
I agree that this case is not an appropriate vehicle for determining whether we should recognize a separate tort of “false light” invasion of privacy. The extensive legal analysis in the principal opinion accurately reflects the state of modern authority-
The plaintiff, at the time of the broadcasts complained of, was a public official— “administrator of City Hospital # 1.” The publications to which he objects charge that he used materials paid for by the city in the construction of his private residence and that an architect employed by the city prepared the plans to this residence. These charges are proper matters of public concern, as to which the plaintiff has no right to privacy. If the allegations are true, then the broadcasts do not violate a legally protected right. If they are false, the plaintiff has a classic action of libel.
The right of privacy inures to persons who are not proper subjects for public scrutiny. In Munden v. Harris, 153 Mo.App. 652, 134 S.W. 1076 (1911), a merchant appropriated a child’s picture for advertising. In Barber v. Time, Inc., 159 S.W.2d 291 (Mo.1942), the defendant exposed the unusual manifestations of the plaintiffs rare disease to a national audience. In one of the best known false light cases, Time, Inc. v. Hill, 385 U.S. 374, 87 S.Ct. 534, 17 L.Ed.2d 456 (1967), inaccurate details were published about a family which had been held hostage by escaped convicts. In Cantrell v. Forest City Publishing Co., 419 U.S. 245, 95 S.Ct. 465, 42 L.Ed.2d 419 (1974), inaccurate statements were published about the poverty and life style of a family following the accidental death of the father. The dominant feature of each of these cases is that private people were inappropriately exposed to public view. This petition shows on its face that this plaintiff is not an appropriate privacy claimant.
The law of libel protects against malicious defamation. The action is carefully confined, because it impacts freedom of expression.1 The two year statute of limitations is a relatively short one. The legislature apparently thought that libel claimants should be required to make their claims quickly. This purpose would be utterly frustrated if a litigant could extend *482the statute simply by giving the action another name.
The judgment is properly affirmed.

. New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964); Philadelphia Newspapers, Inc. v. Hepps, — U.S. -, 106 S.Ct. 1558, — L.Ed.2d -(1986).