Stockton Newspapers, Inc. v. Superior Court

• Decision Date: 20 December 1988
• Docket Number: No. C000029,C000029
• Citation: 254 Cal.Rptr. 389,206 Cal.App.3d 966
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: , 16 Media L. Rep. 1417 STOCKTON NEWSPAPERS, INC., Petitioner, v. SAN JOAQUIN SUPERIOR COURT, Respondent, Wilson STEWART, Real Party in Interest.

Page 389

254 Cal.Rptr. 389

206 Cal.App.3d 966, 16 Media L. Rep. 1417

STOCKTON NEWSPAPERS, INC., Petitioner, v. SAN JOAQUIN SUPERIOR COURT, Respondent, Wilson STEWART, Real Party in Interest.

No. C000029.

Court of Appeal, Third District, California.

Dec. 20, 1988.

Cavalero, Bray, Geiger & Rudquist, John B. Rudquist, Stockton, Crosby, Heafey, Roach & May, Peter W. Davis, John E. Carne and Judith R. Epstein, Oakland, for petitioner

No appearance for respondent.

Babitzke & Meleyco, Kenneth N. Meleyco, Patricia K. Ferguson, Stockton, for real party in interest.

BLEASE, Acting Presiding Justice.

Must a newspaper be convinced that a charge of official misconduct is true before it may publish conflicting accounts of the charge, free of a claim of libel? We conclude that it need not. We hold that a newspaper is privileged to print a fair report, attributed to a third party, of a claim of official misconduct denied by the official, and is under no duty to resolve conflicting claims of what happened. (Civ.Code, § 47, subd. 3.)

This original proceeding arises out of a libel action by Wilson Stewart, a City of Stockton police officer, against defendant Stockton Newspapers, Inc. (Stockton Newspapers), a newspaper publisher. Stewart claims that a newspaper article published by defendant is libelous because it reports an accusation that he improperly procured a false confession to a crime from a person later released as innocent of the crime. The article presents both the accusations of impropriety, made by the person who confessed, and Stewart's denial.

Stockton Newspapers was denied a summary judgment (Code Civ. Proc., § 437c), sought on the grounds that the undisputed facts adduced show that the publication of the Stewart article was privileged under Civil Code section 47, subdivision 4 and the First Amendment. ¹ This writ proceeding followed. We will issue a peremptory writ directing the trial court to grant summary judgment.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

The following predicate facts, adduced in the papers submitted at the summary judgment proceeding, are undisputed.

Stockton Newspapers, Inc., the petitioner, publishes and circulates the Stockton Record, a daily newspaper. On February 6, 1980, the allegedly libelous article entitled "Teen's Month Behind Bars After A Phony Confession" was published in the Stockton Record. The text of the article is as follows, with the portions Stewart alleges to be defamatory underlined.

The Text of the Newspaper Article

"When a detective came to his door on Dec. 20, Aubrey Lewis Miles knew he already had three strikes against him--he was black, he was poor and he wasn't as smart as the people he was dealing with. [p] Miles, 19, was questioned about and then confessed to a murder he didn't commit. He spent more than 30 days in jail before the district attorney's office, itself growing skeptical about the confession, released him and dropped the charges. [p] Miles--who has the 'mind of a 9-year-old,' according to his family--was confronted at his front door at about 8 p.m. that night by Sgt. Wilson Stewart, a police officer for more than 25 years, and a 12-year veteran as a detective. [p] Miles' grandmother, Mrs. Ruth Washington recalls: 'Stewart said he wanted to talk to him privately outside the house. I said they could.' [p] But instead, Miles was taken to police headquarters where he was questioned for about two hours. [p] That night the youngster confessed to the murder of Arcus Brown, who was gunned down on a downtown Stockton street before a crowd of Christmas shoppers a week earlier. [p] Whether Miles blurted out a confession on some impulse or whether Stewart encouraged him into it remains unresolved. Suspect and interrogator give different accounts. [p] Miles, a slow-spoken young man who has a speech impediment, says the policeman 'bribed me with candy' and told him that if he admitted to the murder he would be home in two or three days instead of after 25 years in prison or four years in a mental hospital. [p] Stewart, on the other hand, says that Miles had called him on the phone, saying he knew something about Brown's murder. Later at police headquarters, 'he admitted everything to me. He sits there and calmly tells me this. I didn't solicit the confession, he The Other Evidence Tendered

                voluntarily did it,' Stewart says.  [p] Stewart also says he has never been accused of coercing a confession out of a suspect.  [p] But according to Miles, who police said had never been arrested before, he confessed under extreme pressure.  'I said yes (I was involved in the killing) because I thought I was going to be released in two or three days,' Miles said.  [p] 'I was crying ... he (the policeman) saw that ... I was upset ... he yelled at me.  I didn't know what to think ... I didn't know what to do ... I just wanted to go home.  I told him I didn't know ... but he kept pressing and pressing.  He told me, 'Too many people say you did it.'   He told me I could remain silent, but I didn't even know what he was talking about,' Miles said.  [p] Confession in hand, Stewart then reportedly called the district attorney's office to have Miles charged with murder and conspiracy.  [p] Stewart said the confession was not tape recorded, and that there were no official transcripts made.  'When he came in and talked to me, I asked the D.A. on duty if he wanted a recording--not a tape recording, but a stenographer, and he said "no," ' Stewart explained.  [p] Stewart says he cannot remember the name of the deputy district attorney on duty that night.  [p] Miles was booked into jail at 10:30 p.m. that Thursday night, too late to make the following day's arraignments.  He could not be arraigned over the weekend, and on Monday, he was finally arraigned and then returned to jail on $75,000 bail.  He did not have an attorney actively working his case until Wednesday, six days after his arrest.  [p] The district attorney's office proceeded routinely, according to Kenneth Meleyco, the deputy who ended up handling the case.  [p] 'The only evidence we had was the confession.  When a man confesses you obviously put him in jail until you check out his story--unless it's obviously false.'  [p] Meleyco said he thinks it was a voluntary confession, despite holes that appeared in it later.  'All evidence I have seen ... it was not coerced,' Meleyco said, 'I don't think he (Stewart) would ever do anything like that.  [p] Meleyco said he didn't know why Miles would confess to such a crime.  [p] However, Rolleen McIlwrath, Miles' court-appointed attorney, said, '(Miles) would [206 Cal.App.3d 973] have said yes to anything given the fact that he can easily be led and that he wanted to go home.'  [p] 'The confession was not enough for the arrest, it has to be corroborated.  This one was not.  There has to be some evidence besides a confession.'  [p] The district attorney's office, rapidly losing faith in its main evidence, was coming to the same conclusion.  Meleyco said that his office--and Stewart as well--'were always suspicious of Miles' statements because nothing he said was in line with the physical evidence in the case and with what witnesses had reported.  [p] In the meantime, Stewart maintained his interest in Miles and what he might have to say.  [p] Miles' half-brother, Booker Washington, 30, says that following Miles' arrest and before his arraignment, Stewart arranged a meeting between the two half-brothers at the San Joaquin County Jail, and that Stewart suggested that he take a 'notebook and pencil' to take notes.  [p] 'He (Stewart) never told me he was going to use me as a witness, but he did tell me to take a notebook and pencil,' Washington said.  'I couldn't believe it.'  [p] Miles said Stewart coached him to admit the crime to his brother 15 minutes before the brother's arrival at the jail.  Stewart planted a story in his mind, he said, to tell his older brother--a false story of Miles' involvement in the murder.  [p]  Miles said, 'He kept going over (the story).  After a while I began to believe it.  He told me not to tell anybody.'  [p] Stewart, however, denies even being at the jail during or just before that meeting.  [p] Washington said, 'I started to believe his story.  But I didn't know it was a lie.  I couldn't believe it.  I asked him why, and he said Stewart made him tell that story.'  [p] How Miles and the police originally got together is also unclear.  [p] Police say they received a telephone call from a male who identified himself as Miles and who told investigators that he, James Dennis Scott, 18, and Rachel Ramona Vargas, 18, were involved in the shooting of Brown.  [p] Miles 'just called the police and identified himself and Scott and the woman although  
                the police weren't even looking for him at the time,' Meleyco said.  [p] According to Stewart, Miles called the police department three times to talk about the shooting.  Miles said, however, he only called the police after learning through a friend that they were looking for him.  [p] Miles' lawyer, McIlwrath, said, 'It was a point of crisis.  Once you have a crisis, I think problems are exposed and there are bound to be mistakes.  When mistakes are made, we recognize it, correct it and apologize for it.  I am not going to put the blame on any one individual.'  [p] Stewart says he had all charges against Miles and the other two original suspects dropped 'as soon as I found out that (another suspect) shot the guy.'  [p] His conclusion:  'I know now he wasn't involved.  My opinion on this is that Aubrey called to get attention.'  [p] To Mrs. Washington, though, 'Aubrey has the mind of a 9-year-old.  All I want is my boy's name cleared.' ''
                

Stockton Newspapers supported its motion for summary judgment with a declaration of Armando Durazo, the reporter who authored the article; portions of Stewart's depositions; portions of Miles's grandparents' depositions; a declaration by Stewart relating the factual basis...