Public officials

Newspaper reports about a rumor regarding a local city councilman’s personal relationship with a woman who received a “sweetheart deal” to perform a project for the city were not defamatory, an Alabama appellate court recently held.

A North Carolina judge has ordered an online-news editor to produce the names of six anonymous posters who allegedly posted defamatory comments on his website, although one of them identified himself this morning on a local AM radio station.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that a police department had the authority to search an officer's text messages that were sent using a department-issued pager.

Police Sergeant Jeff Quon could not reasonably "conclude that his messages were in all circumstances immune from scrutiny," wrote Justice Anthony M. Kennedy for the court. Though the court’s ruling was unanimous, two justices wrote separate opinions explaining their reasoning.

A Texas man who took out an ad that said a former mayor broke laws in a city land acquisition must pay damages of $50,000 and take out an ad that retracts his allegations as part of a settlement, The Keller Citizen reported.

A New York newspaper is engaged in a battle to quash a grand jury subpoena for the identities of some of its website commenters.

Iowa Gov. Chet Culver said he will allow the public to see e-mail he sent privately in his first two years in office -- even as counterparts in other states fight for the opposite result.

A defamation lawsuit against U.S. Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) is set to be dismissed after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia (D.C. Cir.) ruled Tuesday that the plaintiff had not shown that Murtha's disputed comments to news reporters went beyond the bounds of his job.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals (D.C. Cir.) heard oral arguments this week over whether Rep. John Murtha should have to testify in a defamation lawsuit he faces over his 2006 comments about the slaying of Iraqi civilians in Haditha.