Court Opinion

ID: 9605634
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 02:39:42.646171+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:10:32.644751
License: Public Domain

HENDLEY, Judge (dissenting). I disagree with the result reached by the majority. The allowance of an absolute privilege to defame is a serious invasion of an individual’s rights. Such a privilege should not be granted in a general investigative proceeding not shown to truly possess the attributes of a quasi-judicial body. Absolute immunity from responsibility without regard to purpose, motive or reasonableness of conduct is, and should be, confined to a very few rather well recognized situations. Stewart v. Ging, 64 N.M. 270, 327 P.2d 333 (1958). I agree that an absolute privilege should be applied to true grievance proceedings concerned with “peer review.” But the evidence in this case establishes that the proceeding was a round table discussion of which no minutes were made. There are no “quasi-judicial” attributes of this Ad Hoc Committee present in the record. To allow an absolute privilege to a proceeding without any vestige of quasi-judicial attributes is to dangerously broaden the privilege. To institute a form of “peer review” as did defendant was not unreasonable. He was also a member of the medical community. As such he would be a member who was entitled to a qualified privilege. See New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964); Curtis Publishing Co. v. Butts, 388 U.S. 130, 87 S.Ct. 1975, 18 L.Ed.2d 1094 (1967). As to those statements which are not absolutely privileged a qualified privilege applies. New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, supra. As to that privilege plaintiff must prove “ . . . that the statement [s] [were] made with ‘actual malice’ — that is, with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.” New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, supra. “Actual malice” being a question of fact the cause should be remanded to the trial court for further proceedings. Accordingly, I respectfully dissent.