New York Times Loses Libel Case

AP via Washington Post ^ | May 24, 2003

[veronica]

A federal jury ruled today that the New York Times and one of its reporters libeled an Ohio Supreme Court justice in an article about a lawsuit filed by the son of Sam Sheppard. But the jury said it was done without malicious intent and refused to award damages.

Justice Francis Sweeney was seeking $15 million. He accused the newspaper and reporter Fox Butterfield of libeling him in an article published April 13, 2000. Sweeney said the report defamed him by falsely saying he used his influence in a case he had been involved in earlier as a prosecutor.

New York Times Loses Libel Case

[Drango]

~snort...LOL...you owe me a new keyboard...I blew coffee out my nose this was so funny.

[Grampa Dave]

Thanks for more good news today about the NY Slimes!

[Consort]

If it's libel shouldn't they be liable even if they're liberal?

[Timesink]

Schadenfreude

This is the New York Times Schadenfreude Ping List. Freepmail me to be added or dropped.

[Grampa Dave]

Ooops, apparently this lie ended up in court, and the Slimes just got hammered.

[aristeides]

I guess the jury felt that, when you're slandered by a journal with no credibility, you have not suffered any damage worth a cash award.

[Grampa Dave]

Your reply is great. I'm about a cup of coffee short and was trying to say what you did in this reply. Now I can just repeat it:

I guess the jury felt that, when you're slandered by a journal with no credibility, you have not suffered any damage worth a cash award.

[Wonder Warthog]

My,my! It never rains but it pours!! It seems that the NYT has suddenly become that Andy Capp character Joe Btfsplk (sp)(the unlucky little guy who always had a rain cloud over his head).

[friendly]

Circulation of the NY Slimes is down 9% recently, BEFORE all these new fiascos. Wait this all this stuff hits the fan!

[friendly]

My,my! It never rains but it pours!! It seems that the NYT has suddenly become that Andy Capp character Joe Btfsplk (sp)(the unlucky little guy who always had a rain cloud over his head).

Al Capp's Little Abner, good buddy.

[Grampa Dave]

As this stuff hits the fans, their circulation will go up in the short term.

Where they are getting hurt is on their newsline that competes with AP and other newslines. A newspaper publishers in other cities are banning any NY Slimes article being posted if there are any unidentified sources quoted in the articles.

As this mess dies down, their circulation will drop even more as you noted.

[Cicero]

Aren't cub reporters taught in Elementary Reporting 101 that if someone's enemy accuses them of doing something wrong, that they should crosscheck it before assuming that the accusation is is true?

Maybe this isn't premeditated libel, but isn't it sloppy, reckless, unprofessional libel?

[friendly]

Credibility is a delicate thing. You eventually pay a price for misconduct. All these endless leftist lies, misrepresentations, and deceit will come home to haunt the Times.

[veronica]

If Howell Raines were to resign, that would go a long way toward restoring some credibilty to the Times. But he won't, ego's too darn inflated. I guess one man's career means more than the restored credibilty of a once-respected paper. Oh well.

[Wonder Warthog]

"Al Capp's Little Abner, good buddy."

!Slapping forehead! You're right. Jubilation T. Cornpone!

[Wolverine]

These are suitable references for your information.

The NYT full staff should be required to write articles applying the principles contained herein..

ASNE Ethics Codes Collection
http://www.asne.org/ideas/codes/codes.htm
The American Society of Newspaper Editors has posted these codes on their website.

Can You Improve Your Code of Ethics?
http://www.asne.org/kiosk/editor/99.feb/steele1.htm
By Bob Steele and Jay Black.
The American Editor, February 1999.

EthicNet
http://www.uta.fi/ethicnet/
EthicNet is a collection of European codes of journalism ethics.

Ethics Connection
http://www.scu.edu/SCU/Centers/Ethics/
The website for the Markkula Center for Applied Ethics at Santa Clara University.

Ethics for Digital Information Providers
http://www.elon.edu/andersj/ethics.html
Janna Quitney Anderson, from the Elon School of Communications, compiled this web page about online news ethics.

Ethics of Enrique's Journey
http://www.spj.org/losangeles/nazario.html
"Los Angeles Times writer Sonia Nazario, winner of the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for feature writing, spoke to the Greater Los Angeles chapter about the ethical challenges she faced writing her six-part series."

Ethics in Journalism
http://www.spj.org/ethics.asp
The ethics section of the Society of Professional Journalists website.

Ethics on Campus: Journalism & College Newspapers
http://members.tripod.com/Islander/indyethics.html
By Francis A. Risso III, Hofstra University.

Ethics on the World Wide Web
http://commfaculty.fullerton.edu lester/ethics/ethics_list.html
This web page was compiled by Paul Lester.

Evolution of the RTNDA Code of Ethics
http://web.missouri.edu/~jourvs/rtcodes.html
By Vernon Stone, Missouri School of Journalism.

FAIR: Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting
http://www.fair.org/
Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting is a national media watch group.

First Amendment Handbook
http://www.rcfp.org/handbook/viewpage.cgi
The Reporters Committee For Freedom of the Press posted this handbook on their website.

Journal of Mass Media Ethics
http://jmme.byu.edu/
The journal's website includes article abstracts and information about the publication.

Journalism Ethics Cases Online
http://www.journalism.indiana.edu/Ethics/
These ethics cases come from the
Indiana University School of Journalism.

Media Ethics Division: AEJMC
http://jcomm.uoregon.edu/~tbivins/aejmc_ethics/home.html
The Media Ethics Division of AEJMC includes more than 300 scholars researching and teaching in the fields of mass communication ethics.

Media Ethics Resources on WWW
http://www.ethics.ubc.ca/resources/media/
The Centre for Applied Ethics at the University of British Columbia maintains this web page.

Mediaethics.ca
http://www.mediaethics.ca/
A Canadian resource page on media ethics.

Mediaethics.org
http://www.mediaethics.org
Links to online resources about media ethics.

Media Watch
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/media/
The online site for "Media Watch" reports
from the PBS NewsHour television program.

Minnesota News Council
http://www.mtn.org/~newscncl/
The News Council provides a mechanism for the public to hold news outlets accountable.

OJR Section: Ethics
http://www.ojr.org/ojr/ethics/
Online Journalism Review is produced at the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Southern California.

ONO: Organization of News Ombudsmen
http://www.newsombudsmen.org/
The ONO website is a place where news ombudsmen
can share information and ideas.

Payne Awards for Ethics in Journalism
http://jcomm.uoregon.edu/departments/payneawards/
Established in 1999 at the University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication.

Poynter Online's Ethics Journal
http://poynteronline.org/column.asp?id=53
Kelly McBride's journalism ethics column.

Poynter Online's Ethics Resources
http://poynteronline.org/subject.asp?id=32
Resources from the Poynter website.

Poynter Online's Links to the News
http://poynteronline.org/column.asp?id=49&aid=7952
Resources about reporting on religion.

Poynter Online's Talk about Ethics
http://poynteronline.org/column.asp?id=36
Bob Steele's journalism ethics column.

RTNDA Code of Ethics
http://www.rtnda.org/ethics/coe.shtml
The ethics code for the
Radio-Television News Directors Association.

RTNDF Ethics Project and Coverage Guidelines
http://www.rtnda.org/ethics/fepcg.shtml
The Radio and Television News Directors Foundation's Journalism Ethics program compiled this web page.

Silha Center for the Study of Media Ethics and Law
http://www.silha.umn.edu/
The Center was established in 1984 within the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Minnesota.

Standards for Education Reporters
http://www.ewa.org/offers/publications/EWAStandards.pdf
National Education Writers Association voluntary guidelines.

Syllabi: Ethics and the Internet
http://www.duke.edu/~wgrobin/ethics/sum02/
Wendy Robinson prepared this syllabi for her class at Duke.

Syllabi: Mass Media Ethics
http://jcomm.uoregon.edu/~tbivins/J397/
Tom Bivins prepared this syllabi for his class at the University of Oregon.

Washington News Council
http://www.wanewscouncil.org/
"An independent, nonprofit, statewide organization whose members share a common belief that fair, accurate and balanced news media are vital to our democracy."

Web Resources for Studying Journalism Ethics
http://www2.hawaii.edu/~tbrislin/jethics.html
Compiled by Tom Brislin, Department of Journalism, University of Hawaii.

World-Wide Codes of Journalism Ethics
http://www.presswise.org.uk/ethics.htm
This list was compiled by PressWise.

[Valin]

But the jury said it was done without malicious intent and refused to award damages.

I was under the impression that Sulivan V NY Times stayed that there had to be malice shown for there to be libel in regards to a "public person".

[MeekOneGOP]

[martin_fierro]

A pyrrhic victory, but I'll take it.