False Light

After our last class, I found myself a bit confused about False Light vs. Libel so I thought I'd look into the two areas a bit more. In doing so, I found an interesting case that discusses false light and the idea that it is "outdated". In the case that I read, (which took place in 1994) the Rocky Mountain News published several stories about a local crime family. In doing so, one of the children of the family came forward and sued the publication, claiming defamation and "false light" invasion of privacy. Although the court heard the guy's case, the result was that the state of Colorado wouldn't recognize it as a legitimate claim (apparently Colorado is a state that does not recognize false light). I found one particular quote of the article quite intriguing, it notes, "The Colorado case is the latest step in a slow but important trend among states that have decided that this controversial form of privacy claim has no place in their courts. The trend is good news for the media, who have enough to worry about with defamation and other privacy lawsuits and who inevitably become the main targets of false light where it exists."

You can read the entire article at: http://www.rcfp.org/news/mag/26-4/lib-falselig.html.

A more recent article (published Oct. 27, 2008) discussed the state of Florida's decision in a recent false light case. The claim included a man suing a Florida newspaper for mentioning, during an article about a paving business, that he “shot and killed” his wife. Not until later in the article did it mention that the shooting was part of a hunting accident. He argued that while the statement was strictly true, the lack of context left the impression that he had killed her intentionally. It cast him in a false light, he claimed, even if it wasn’t strictly false. The remainder of this article can be found at: http://public.getlegal.com/articles.

I also found this site to be extremely informative in describing the difference between false light and defamation claims: http://www.citmedialaw.org/legal-guide/false-light.