Chapman v. Journal Concepts, Inc.
| Decision Date | 07 November 2007 |
| Docket Number | Civil No. 07-00002 JMS/LEK. |
| Citation | 528 F.Supp.2d 1081 |
| Parties | Craig Elmer ("Owl") CHAPMAN, Plaintiff, v. JOURNAL CONCEPTS, INC., a California Corporation, d.b.a, The Surfer's Journal; Jeff Johnson; Steve Pezman; Debbee Pezman; Dan Milnor; Scott Hulet; and Jeff Divine, Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Hawaii |
Arthur, E. Ross, Law Office of Arthur E. Ross, Honolulu, HI, for Plaintiff.
Elijah Yip, Jeffrey S. Portnoy, Cades Schutte LLP, Honolulu, HI, for Defendants.
ORDER GRANTING IN PART AND DENYING IN PART DEFENDANTS' MOTION FOR PARTIAL SUMMARY JUDGMENT
Craig "Owl" Chapman ("Plaintiff'), a surfer and surfboard craftsman, sued The Surfer's Journal, author Jeff Johnson ("Johnson"), photographer Dan Milnor ("Milnor"), editor Scott Hulet, photo editor Jeff Divine, and publishers Steve and Debbee Pezman (collectively, "Defendants") over an August/September 2006 magazine issue in which Defendants published an article recounting Johnson's pursuit of a custom-shaped single-fin surfboard, photographs, and other surfers' recollections of Plaintiff. The court finds that Plaintiff is a general public figure within the surfing community and that his defamation and defamation-based claims are governed by the actual malice standard set forth in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964) and its progeny. The court also finds that Plaintiffs claims for invasion of privacy and misappropriation/unauthorized use of his name and photograph in an unfavorable publication are not viable. Finally, the court declines to grant summary judgment on Plaintiff's false light claim.
Plaintiff is a surfer and surfboard shaper living on Oahu's North Shore. As described in The Encyclopedia of Surfing, Plaintiff became
famous in the early and mid-70's for his tuberiding at Sunset Beach and Maalaea, and for his flamboyant "hood ornament stance" at Pipeline, where he'd race through the tube with arms spread and his right knee dropped to the deck of his board. . . . Craig—nicknamed "Owl" as, a play on his woeful nearsightedness — soon became one of the most dedicated surfers on the North Shore. . . . Chapman remained a part of the North Shore surf scene long after most all his contemporaries moved on, and became known for his zoned-out but epigrammatic phrasing. "When I was 22," he said in 1985, "I had a Cadillac, ten surfboards, and ten girlfriends, Man, I thought it would be like that forever." As journalist Mike Latronic later described it, Chapman "walks the fine line between profound philosopher and space-cadet."
Defs.' Ex. A at D00498-99. Plaintiff dominated the surf breaks for many years. As a 1985 article in Surfing Magazine observed,
[o]f all the . . . surf cats who were early pioneers of performance surfing at big Sunset Beach and Waimea Bay, only Owl Chapman has persevered. You could never take an ounce of respect away from legends like Jeff Hakman or Sam Hawk or any of those brave souls of fifteen years ago, venturing out to second reef Sunset, testing their equipment and state of mind; all of these men are brave heroes. But who still lives there and surfs Sunset like an anxious zealot? Craig "Owl" Chapman, the man time forgot.
. . .
Here is a man who has been invited to seven or eight Duke Classics, surfed in the Smirnoff, Masters, Coke, Stubbies and Gunston contests and proven himself as one of the greatest big-wave riders in history, and at thirty-five still possesses the drive and initiative to rush into dribbling Laniakea to compete with some of the world's best small-wave competitors.
Defs.' Ex. C at D00517.
Revered as a daring and elite athlete who routinely surfed the island's biggest and most dangerous wave breaks, Plaintiff was considered to be one of the
North Shore's most committed surfers— not the touring professionals or visiting superstars, but an elite group within that realm, the ones who live in Hawaii and base their entire existence around riding mountainous, terrifying surf . . . [and who] share the same qualities of presence and bravado in life-threatening conditions, and . . . possess a brand of intelligence that can only be drawn from the ocean.
Defs.' Ex. D at D00521; see also Defs.' Ex. H. A "key figure" in surfing, Plaintiff was
fully legit in the water. He's been out in more big swells than anyone his age . . . dodging, scratching, diving, styling and sensing waves before most. . . .
Owl made his mark with a style born of originality. . . . [H]e came away with some of the more memorable photos, and his signature move had as much panache as a goofyfoot's barrel.
Defs.' Ex. E at D00527-28. Plaintiff's unique surfing style, innovative surfing moves, and colorful personality have made him well-known. Recalling some of Plaintiffs "classic, anti-hero antics," an author for Surfer magazine writes, Id. at D00527. In short, Plaintiff is exalted as "a living legend on the North Shore, a man who surfed second-reef Pipeline backside when it was considered beyond the limits of good sense; a man who has surfed big Sunset as much as anyone," and a surfer who "knew no fear." Defs.' Ex. D at D00522, D00524.
Plaintiff turned his surfing talent into a business: surfboard shaping. Surfboard designs may be customized by length, width, material, shape, rails, fins, rocker, and lift to account for a surfer's height, weight, and surfing ability and to maximize speed or stability in waves of a certain size and break. See, e.g., Surfboard Design, available at http://360guide.info/surfing/surfboard-design.html?Itemid = 75 (last visited Oct. 20, 2007) (describing design elements taken into consideration for custom surfboards). When Johnson, a surfer himself, was looking for a custom surfboard to use at Waimea, he was pointed in Plaintiff's direction. As Johnson recounts in "El Hombre Invisible (With Apologies to William S. Burroughs): An Owl Chapman Story," published in the August/September 2006 edition of The Surfer's Journal, a bi-monthly magazine,
[a] good single-fin gun is hard to find. And the guys who know how to shape them are either dead, too drunk, or living in some dusty trailer on the outskirts of Cabo. I wanted one but was at a loss for names. I talked to shaper Jeff Busman about it and without hesitation he mentioned Owl.
"Owl," Jeff said,
Defs.' Ex. 0 at D00107. Thus began the story of Johnson's experience purchasing a custom surfboard from Plaintiff, and the impetus for Plaintiff's present suit.
In the allegedly defamatory article, Johnson writes of his initial meeting with Plaintiff:
The measurements were made, the lines were drawn, and he was slicing through the foam with a handsaw. Owl made a humming sound as he walked back and forth around the blank. He would stop here and there to make the tiniest adjustments, explaining to me exactly what he was doing. Out came the Surform® and he ran it up and down a few times on each rail. I looked at my watch and realized we had been there for over an hour.
"Now," he said as he put the Surform® away and clapped the dust from his hands,
The first rule of backyard board orders is that you never, NEVER pay up front. But for some reason I felt powerless. I wasn't thinking straight. Next thing I knew, we were in my van driving to Foodland to get money out of the bank machine.
"Alright," I said to Owl as I handed him a wad of cash, "you gotta promise me that you'll finish it this week."
"Yeah, yeah," he said looking nervously from side to side.
Id. at D00109. Johnson, however, did not receive his surfboard that week, or for the next several. He narrates his efforts to find Plaintiff, searching Plaintiff's usual haunts, the supermarket, and the waves, all to no avail. As Johnson writes,
[t]he first swell of the season had come and gone, and I didn't have a board for Waimea. This became an ongoing joke with my friends. And it was all my fault. You NEVER pay up front.
Checking the waves at Ehukai one afternoon I ran into fellow lifeguard and disgruntled, airbrusher Mike Heart. "Got your board from Owl yet?" he said laughing.
"What do you think?" I said, trying not to laugh with him. "It's really not that funny."
Id. at D00111.
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