Court Opinion

ID: 9789569
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 01:38:33.18109+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:23.248074
License: Public Domain

LAVENDER, Vice Chief Justice,
dissenting:
While better language could have been chosen, the editorial, in my opinion, is not libelous per se. Here, the editorial found it difficult to understand why Winters could not have as fair a trial in Oklahoma City as in any other part of the state due to news media coverage. The same newspapers and television broadcasts were available to the people of Oklahoma both in and out of Oklahoma City. Winters would be just as guilty in one part of the state as the other. It does not state Winters was guilty. It is not libelous per se.
There are three classes as to words charged to be libelous: (1) Those not possible of defamatory meaning; (2) those reasonably susceptible of both a defamatory and an innocent meaning; and (3) those clearly defamatory on their face. Fite v. Oklahoma Pub. Co., 146 Okl. 150, 293 P. 1073 (1930).1 I would place the published editorial here in the second class. It may have been defamatory by reason of the ambiguity of the words used. The editorial is not susceptible to only one meaning so as to be clearly defamatory on its face, and is not libelous per se.
With the petition containing no allegations as to special damages and the determination the editorial was not libelous per se, the trial court did not err in concluding the petition was insufficient.
I dissent.
I am authorized to state that BERRY and DOOLIN, JJ., concur in the views herein expressed.

. “Syllabus by the Court
“Words charged to be libelous fall into one of three classes: First, those that cannot possibly bear a defamatory meaning; second, those that are reasonably susceptible of a defamatory meaning, as well as an innocent one; third, those that are clearly defamatory on their face. The second class are those words that are reasonably susceptible of a defamatory meaning, as well as an innocent one, and may be made defamatory by reason of their ambiguity, or by pleading certain extrinsic facts connecting said facts with the publication and by pleading that the article was meant and understood by the general public to have such a meaning, and that the general public so construed the publication.”