Jury find Rolling stone magazine of libel

[mr friendly guy]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-11-05/r ... ty/7997720

Jury finds Rolling Stone's debunked campus rape story defamed University of Virginia administrator
Updated earlier today at 10:13am

A US federal jury has found Rolling Stone magazine, its publisher and a reporter defamed a University of Virginia administrator who sued them for $US7.5 million ($9.77 million) over a discredited story about gang rape at a fraternity house.

Jurors found that journalist Sabrina Rubin Erdely was responsible for libel, with actual malice, and that Rolling Stone and its publisher were also responsible for defaming Ms Eramo.

Ms Eramo claimed the November 2014 article falsely said she discouraged the woman identified only as Jackie from reporting the incident to police. A police investigation found no evidence to back up Jackie's claims.

Rolling Stone's attorneys said there was no evidence that the reporter knew what she was writing about Ms Eramo was false or had serious doubts about whether it was true.

In a statement released on Friday (local time), the magazine apologized to Ms Eramo and anyone else impacted by the story.

"It is our deep hope that our failings do not deflect from the pervasive issues discussed in the piece, and that reporting on sexual assault cases ultimately results in campus policies that better protect our students," the statement read.

"We will continue to publish stories that shine a light on the defining social, political and cultural issues of our times, and we will continue to seek the truth in every story we publish."

The jury found that Erdely acted with actual malice on six claims — two statements in the article and four statements to media outlets after the story was published.

Among them was one in which Erdely wrote in the story that Ms Eramo had a "non-reaction" when she heard from Jackie that two other women were also gang raped at the same fraternity at the university.

Jurors also found that the decision by Rolling Stone and Wenner Media, the magazine's publisher, to repost the story on December 5, 2014 with an editor's note acknowledging that there were discrepancies in Jackie's account counted as "republishing" the debunked story.

The magazine did not officially retract the story and remove it from its website until the following April.

Jurors heard closing arguments on Tuesday after listening to more than two weeks' worth of evidence.

Over the course of the more than two-week trial, the jury of eight women and two men watched 11 hours of video testimony, heard from a dozen live witnesses and examined nearly 300 exhibits.

The judge earlier this week dismissed Ms Eramo's claim that the story, when taken as a whole, implied that she was a "false friend" to Jackie. Rolling Stone had called that a "critical element" of her case.

Because the judge determined that Ms Eramo was a public figure, she had to prove that Rolling Stone made statements with "actual malice", meaning the publication knew that what it was writing about her was false or entertained serious doubts as to whether it might be true.

"The jury's verdict is a complete vindication of Nicole Eramo, and a complete repudiation of Rolling Stone's and Ms Erdely's false and defamatory article," Ms Eramo's attorney, Libby Locke, said in a statement.

Mark MacDougall, an attorney at New York's Akin Gump Strauss Hauer and Feld law firm, said actual malice did not mean the defendants had to dislike Ms Eramo or wish her harm.

"When a reporter, an editor or a magazine behave like they don't care whether what they publish is false, that's enough to support a finding of actual malice," Mr MacDougall said in an emailed comment.
Ms Eramo's attorneys argued that Erdely came into the story with a preconceived storyline about institutional indifference to sexual assault and intentionally disregarded statements and facts about Ms Eramo that did not fit that narrative.

They claimed Erdely also ignored red flags about Jackie's credibility, including the changing account of Jackie's rape and her refusal to let Erdely talk to people who could corroborate her story.

Attorneys for Rolling Stone acknowledged that Erdely and her editors made serious reporting mistakes, but argued that there was no evidence they acted with actual malice.

The magazine's attorneys said that Erdely and her editors had full faith in Jackie until they realized she was no longer credible in early December after the story was published.

I am not surprised news outlets write something which isn't true. I am surprised they were successfully sued.

[Sidewinder]

It's not the first time a libel victim sued the media (see Richard Jewell, who was publicly crucified for the Centennial Olympic Park bombing in 1996). It's still something that should happen more often. False accusations like this can literally ruin someone's life, as Jesse Ventura can testify.

[Patroklos]

This was just a signal of things to come for Rolling Stone. The far larger suit from the fraternity is coming and if this women got her payout there is no question the same case will be even more damning for Rolling Stone in that case.