Libel

A California appellate court upheld the dismissal of a libel suit brought by the head of a small startup tech company against the Internet blogging company Gawker Media.

A Virginia trial court threw out a $3 million libel verdict against a local newspaper, finding that a local school official failed to show that the allegedly defamatory article was published with actual malice.

An appeal in a defamation case against the late journalist Andrew Breitbart will proceed after a federal appeals court denied a motion to have it dismissed.

Shirley Sherrod, a former official in the Obama administration, sued Breitbart last year, alleging that two writers from his website, BigGovernment.com, defamed her in a YouTube video, which she said unfairly edited a speech she made. Breitbart, a known conservative commentator, died in March.

The Rhode Island Supreme Court upheld the dismissal of a defamation claim brought by a restaurant owner against two journalists for their coverage of a 2009 "off the record" event at his restaurant where attendees included politicians, businesspeople and press members.

The Texas Supreme Court declined to rule on a libel appeal brought against two Texas newspapers by alleged child abusers last Friday because a lower court judge previously accepted a bribe to decide against the publications. The high court also ruled void the trial judge's decision.

A California appeals court ruled Friday that a malicious prosecution lawsuit against a Los Angeles-based attorney may proceed, reversing a lower court's holding that the state's anti-SLAPP statute protected the lawyer.

A libel case brought by a 'birther' -- those who question whether President Obama is a natural-born American and eligible to be president -- ended prematurely when a U.S. district judge granted a magazine's motion to dismiss under the D.C. Anti-SLAPP Act, which protects speech relating to issues of public interest.

A federal court in Buffalo said last week that peer-reviewed journals, not courtrooms, are the proper place to vet scientific disputes. A libel claim brought by ONY, Inc., against the Journal of Perinatology for a negative study of an ONY pharmaceutical product was dismissed.

The New Jersey Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that a defamation suit over online accusations of child sexual abuse could still proceed, even though the plaintiff could not show he was harmed.

The decision upheld a 2010 appeals court ruling that New Jersey First Amendment attorneys hoped would lead to a change in the law by the state's Supreme Court.