Healey v. New England Newspapers, Inc.

• Decision Date: 02 February 1987
• Docket Number: No. 84-351-A,84-351-A
• Parties: , 13 Media L. Rep. 2148 Paul J. M. HEALEY, M.D. v. NEW ENGLAND NEWSPAPERS, INC. d/b/a The Pawtucket Evening Times. ppeal.
• Court: Rhode Island Supreme Court

Page 147

520 A.2d 147

55 USLW 2552, 13 Media L. Rep. 2148

Paul J. M. HEALEY, M.D. v. NEW ENGLAND NEWSPAPERS, INC. d/b/a The Pawtucket Evening Times.

No. 84-351-Appeal.

Supreme Court of Rhode Island.

Feb. 2, 1987.

Joseph A. Kelly, Carroll Kelly & Murphy, John R. Mahoney, Baluch Mahoney & Gianfrancesco, Providence, for plaintiff.

Michael Horan, Pawtucket, for defendant.

OPINION

SHEA, Justice.

This matter is before the court on the plaintiff's appeal from a directed verdict entered for the defendants. The Superior Court lawsuit for defamation arose out of two newspaper articles published by the defendant the Pawtucket Evening Times (hereinafter The Times) on June 24 and June 25, 1980, regarding the actions of the plaintiff, Dr. Paul J.M. Healey. At the close of the evidence the defendant moved for a directed verdict. The trial justice granted the motion. We reverse.

The alleged libelous publications arose from the following facts. In early June 1980 two employees of the Pawtucket-Central Falls YMCA (YMCA), Beverly Tillier and James Greene, resigned upon request by the YMCA personnel committee. A controversy among other YMCA employees developed over the discharge of Tillier and Greene. The plaintiff was president of the YMCA at this time but played no role in the discharge of these employees.

On June 23, 1980, at approximately 6 p.m., the YMCA board of directors held its monthly meeting in the physical fitness center, a structure in the YMCA complex located approximately 350 to 400 yards from the entrance to MacColl Field in Pawtucket. There was concern that a possible disturbance might take place at MacColl Field owing to the terminations of Tillier and Greene, and as a result security was hired for the meeting.

After a roll call was taken of the directors, Dr. Healey asked all who were not members of the board to excuse themselves and leave the room. At that time Gerald Lampinski, who had been active in the Darlington Plains Outpost (an affiliate of the Pawtucket YMCA), informed Dr. Healey that he was in attendance at the meeting to represent the interests of an absent member, a Mr. Sousa. Doctor Healey told Lampinski that under the rules of the meeting Lampinski would have to leave. Lampinski entered his objections and left the meeting.

Doctor Healey testified that approximately one-half hour after the meeting had begun, Frank Smith, a staff member and executive director of the Westwood Branch of the Pawtucket YMCA, approached Dr. Healey and Robert Bendl, the general executive director of the Pawtucket YMCA, and told them that Lampinski had collapsed outside at the front of the property. Doctor Healey asked Smith if he could be of any help, and according to Dr. Healey, Smith said that Dr. Healey's help was not needed because Lampinski was being attended to by two people using CPR, that a rescue vehicle was either on the scene or immediately expected on the scene, and that Lampinski was in the process of being transported to the hospital. Smith claimed that he had been advised of these events by Esselton McNulty, the executive director of the family branch of the Pawtucket YMCA, who had left the board meeting after the security guard stationed at the complex advised him of Lampinski's collapse. McNulty testified that after leaving the board meeting, he was informed by Raymond Bergeron, a YMCA member who had been picketing at MacColl Field, that Lampinski had collapsed, that he was being attended by a medic, and that an ambulance had been called. The board meeting continued while the conversation between Smith, Bendl and Healey took place. After the exchange among these three individuals concluded, Dr. Healey continued to preside over the meeting.

At approximately 10 p.m. on June 23, 1980, Dr. Healey contacted the coronary care unit of the hospital to which Lampinski had been transported. Doctor Healey learned that Lampinski had died.

On June 23, 1980, Edward Gaulin, a reporter for the Times, was present at MacColl Field and saw Lampinski collapse at approximately 6:15 p.m. Gaulin and two unidentified males then administered CPR to Lampinski. Approximately five to ten minutes elapsed between the time Lampinski collapsed and the time the emergency vehicle arrived at the scene.

At MacColl Field on the evening in question, Gaulin talked to Bergeron, who complained that no one had come out of the board meeting to assist Lampinski.

On June 24, 1980, defendant published an article by reporter Gaulin about the previous evening's events. The first edition of the paper was published without any reference to criticism of Dr. Healey. However, the fourth edition of the article reported that Bergeron, a friend and supporter of Lampinski, was critical of plaintiff, a surgeon, for his failure to respond to Lampinski's collapse. On June 25, 1980, defendant published another article stating that members of Lampinski's family, after reading the fourth edition of the article of June 24, were angry because they felt Lampinski should have been given early attention by either a doctor or a paramedic at the board meeting.

Lampinski's sons, John and Jeffrey Lampinski, testified that after they had received several calls from friends and relatives outraged over the doctor's apparent lack of response to Lampinski's collapse, they contacted a few other persons who had witnessed the incident. After hearing different versions of the events surrounding their father's death, they went to Gaulin's office in an attempt to learn the truth.

As a result of that conversation, Gaulin wrote another article, published on June 25, 1980, reporting the sons' criticism of plaintiff for his failure to aid their father. Both sons stated that the June 25 article was a fair statement of the views expressed during their meeting with Gaulin.

At the close of evidence defendant moved for a directed verdict, and the trial justice granted the motion, stating that Bergeron and Lampinski's sons had a right to voice their opinions and that defendant had a right to report them. The trial justice declared that a libelous publication must contain a false statement of fact that is defamatory. The trial justice held that neither article contained a false statement of fact. He also declared that opinions reported accurately are not actionable.

This court performs the same function as the trial justice in reviewing a motion for a directed verdict. The evidence is viewed in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party, without weighing the evidence or assessing the credibility of witnesses, and only those inferences that support the nonmoving party's claim are drawn. If issues exist upon which reasonable persons might reach different conclusions, the motion should be denied. Major v. Drapeau, 507 A.2d 938, 940 (R.I.1986).

We begin our analysis by noting that an action in defamation requires proof of " '(a) a false and defamatory statement concerning another; (b) an unprivileged publication to a third party; (c) fault amounting at least to negligence on the part of the publisher;' and (d) damages, unless the statement is actionable irrespective of special harm." Lyons v. Rhode Island Public Employees Council 94, 516 A.2d 1339, 1342 (R.I.1986) (quoting 3 Restatement (Second) Torts § 558 (1977)). Furthermore, "Rhode Island law incorporates the concept of falsity into its definition of a defamatory statement." ¹ 516 A.2d at 1342. As this court has stated:

"[A]ny words, if false and malicious, imputing conduct which injuriously affects a man's reputation, or which tends to degrade him in society or bring him into public hatred and contempt, are in their nature defamatory * * *." Elias v. Youngken, 493 A.2d 158, 161 (R.I.1985) (quoting Reid v. Providence Journal Co., 20 R.I. 120, 124-25, 37 A. 637, 638 (1897)).

This court has also stated that "[t]he question of whether or not the meaning of a particular communication is defamatory, is one of law for the court." Gordon v. St. Joseph's Hospital, 496 A.2d 132, 136 (R.I.1985) (quoting Elias v. Youngken, 493 A.2d 158, 161 (R.I.1985)). However, whereas the threshold determination of whether a statement is capable of bearing a defamatory meaning is for the court to decide, the ultimate conclusion on whether such a meaning was indeed conveyed is for the jury to decide. Cianci v. New Times Publishing Co., 639 F.2d 54, 60 (2d Cir.1980); 3 Restatement (Second) Torts, § 614.

In an often-quoted dictum from Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, 339-40, 94 S.Ct. 2997, 3007, 41 L.Ed.2d 789, 805 (1974), the Supreme Court stated:

"Under the First Amendment there is no such thing as a false idea. However pernicious an opinion may seem, we depend for its correction not on the conscience of judges and juries but on the competition of other ideas."

Relying in part on Gertz, the American Law Institute adopted the view of the 3 Restatement (Second) Torts § 566 at 170 that "a statement in the form of an opinion * * * is actionable only if it implies the allegation of undisclosed defamatory facts as the basis for the opinion." This formulation was quoted with approval in Belliveau v. Rerick, 504 A.2d 1360, 1362 (R.I.1986), and in Hawkins v. Oden, 459 A.2d 481, 484 (R.I.1983). In Hawkins this court quoted the language of the Restatement as follows:

" 'It is the function of the court to determine whether an expression of opinion is capable of bearing a defamatory meaning because it may reasonably be understood to imply the assertion of undisclosed facts that justify the expressed opinion about the plaintiff or his conduct * * *.' " Id. at 484.

Comment c to § 566 of the Restatement explains that a plaintiff may recover in a defamation action if the expressed opinion is based on undisclosed or assumed defamatory facts of which the listener is unaware. As stated by the Supreme Court of Colorado, "The opinion must appear reasonably to the listener to be based on defamatory facts which the reporter has not disclosed to the...