Court Opinion

ID: 9702509
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 23:14:33.508949+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:21:38.162699
License: Public Domain

Souris, J.
By affirming summary judgment for defendant on the ground that she was protected by a qualified privilege, Mr. Justice Kelly implies that defendant’s letter is defamatory. In the face of Judge Fox’s apodietic finding that it was not libelous, Justice Kelly would have us assume that it is, without specifying in what manner it defames plaintiff. *662I agree with the trial judge. Nothing contained in defendant’s letter to the health department defamed plaintiff within the commonly accepted meaning of the word. See 3 Restatement, Torts § 559.* It was, indeed, sharply critical of plaintiff’s performance of her duties as a public health nurse, but it was criticism, as Judge Fox noted, of plaintiff’s bad taste, her poor judgment, in handling a matter of some delicacy to the parties directly involved and to their friendly neighbors. I find disturbing the suggestion implicit in what Justice Kelly has written that a citizen risks suit for defamation merely for expressing such sentiments. More to the point, I find no currently respectable authority (see New York Times Company v. Sullivan, 376 US 254 [84 S Ct 710, 11 L ed 2d 686], 32 Law Week 4184, decided by the United States supreme court March 9, 1964) in support of the suggestion.
The judgment should be affirmed, and costs taxed against plaintiff.
Kavanagh, C. J., and Dethmers, Black, and Adams, J J., concurred with Souris, J.

 “A communication is defamatory if it tends so to harm the reputation of another as to lower him in the estimation of the community or to deter third persons from associating or dealing with him.”