McQueen v. Fayette County School Corp.

• Court: Court of Appeals of Indiana
• Citation: 711 N.E.2d 62
• Docket Number: No. 21A01-9810-CV-395.,21A01-9810-CV-395.
• Parties: Hayden McQUEEN, Appellant-Plaintiff, v. FAYETTE COUNTY SCHOOL CORPORATION, Jerry Knorr, its Superintendent, and Larry Miller, its employee, Appellees-Defendants.
• Decision Date: 25 May 1999

711 N.E.2d 62

Hayden McQUEEN, Appellant-Plaintiff,
v.
FAYETTE COUNTY SCHOOL CORPORATION, Jerry Knorr, its Superintendent, and Larry Miller, its employee, Appellees-Defendants.

No. 21A01-9810-CV-395.

Court of Appeals of Indiana.

May 25, 1999.

711 N.E.2d 63

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

711 N.E.2d 64

John P. Young, Young & Young, Indianapolis, Indiana, Attorney for Appellant.

John P. Daly, Jr., Stephenson Daly Morow & Kurnik, Indianapolis, Indiana, Attorney for Appellees.

711 N.E.2d 63

OPINION

NAJAM, Judge

STATEMENT OF THE CASE

On July 17, 1997, Hayden McQueen filed a defamation action against the Fayette County School Corporation ("the School"), Jerry Knorr, the School's Superintendent, and Larry Miller, a teacher and coach at the School (collectively, "Defendants"). Defendants filed a Motion to Dismiss under Indiana Trial Rule 12(B)(6) for failure to state a claim. After a hearing, the trial court granted the motion to dismiss, and McQueen now appeals.

We reverse.

ISSUE

McQueen presents one issue for review: whether the trial court erroneously dismissed the action based on Defendants' contention that "opinion" is privileged under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.

FACTS

According to McQueen's complaint, on November 4, 1996, Larry Miller:

In the "presence and hearing of Glen Sheperd, Bill Hank, the Fayette Girls' Basketball Team, and several other persons maliciously spoke the following false and defamatory words:

that "you McQueen and your friends, including Joe `Doc' Heavey, have destroyed and undermined the girls' basketball program and get out of here." "

At the time, McQueen was employed as a scout for the School's girls' basketball team and as a coach at a local basketball camp. McQueen's complaint alleged that Miller's statement was false and defamatory and that it "conveyed ... an imputation of wrong doing or a meaning that he and others were guilty of some specific offense." The complaint further alleged that the statement injured McQueen's reputation and has prevented him from working as a basketball scout and coach. McQueen sought damages in the amount of $300,000.00.

711 N.E.2d 65

DISCUSSION AND DECISION

Standard of Review

It is well settled that a complaint may not be dismissed for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted, unless it appears to a certainty on the face of the complaint that the complaining party is not entitled to any relief. Hanover Logansport, Inc. v. Robert C. Anderson, Inc., 512 N.E.2d 465, 468 (Ind.Ct.App.1987). In ruling on a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim, the trial court is required to view the complaint in a light most favorable to the non-moving party and with every intendment in his favor. Id. The court may only look to the complaint, and well-pleaded material must be taken as admitted. Id.

Under notice pleading, a plaintiff need only plead the operative facts involved in the litigation. Thus, a complaint is sufficient if it states any set of allegations, no matter how unartfully pleaded, upon which the trial court could have granted relief. Runde v. Vigus Realty, Inc., 617 N.E.2d 572, 575 (Ind.Ct.App.1993). Stated differently, the plaintiff is required to provide a "clean and concise statement that will put the defendants on notice as to what has taken place and the theory that the plaintiff plans to pursue." Impink v. City of Indianapolis, Bd. of Pub. Works, 612 N.E.2d 1125, 1127 (Ind.Ct.App.1993).

This Court views motions to dismiss for failure to state a claim with disfavor because such motions undermine the policy of deciding causes of action on their merits. Hill v. Beghin, 644 N.E.2d 893, 895 (Ind.Ct. App.1994), trans. denied. When reviewing a trial court's grant of a motion to dismiss, we view the pleadings in a light most favorable to the non-moving party, and we draw every reasonable inference in favor of that party. Id. We will not affirm a dismissal under Trial Rule 12(B)(6) unless it is apparent that the facts alleged in the challenged pleading are incapable of supporting relief under any set of circumstances. Id.

Defamation and the "Opinion" Privilege

Defamation is that which tends to injure reputation or to diminish esteem, respect, good will, or confidence in the plaintiff, or to excite derogatory feelings or opinions about the plaintiff. Kitco, Inc. v. Corporation for General Trade, 706 N.E.2d 581, 587 (Ind.Ct.App.1999). To recover in an action for defamation, that which caused the alleged defamation must be both false and defamatory. Id. Moreover, a plaintiff must establish the basic elements of defamation: (1) a communication with a defamatory imputation, (2) malice, (3) publication, and (4) damages. Rambo v. Cohen, 587 N.E.2d 140, 145 (Ind. Ct.App.1992), trans. denied. The determination of whether a communication is defamatory is a question of law for the court. Id.

With respect to "defamatory imputation," some communications are reasonably susceptible to either a defamatory or a nondefamatory interpretation. Id. Words not actionable in themselves may become actionable by their allusion to some extrinsic fact, or by being used and understood in a different sense from their natural meaning. Hays v. Mitchell, 7 Blackf. 117 (1844). Such words are deemed actionable per quod, and they acquire a defamatory meaning when placed in context or are connected with extrinsic facts or circumstances. Jacobs v. City of Columbus, 454 N.E.2d 1253, 1264 (Ind.Ct. App.1983) (citing concurring opinion in Gibson v. Kincaid, 140 Ind.App. 186, 221 N.E.2d 834 (1966)). If the defamatory nature of the words appears without resort to extrinsic facts or circumstances, then the words are deemed actionable per se.

In its motion to dismiss, Defendants characterized Miller's statement to McQueen as "opinion" and argued that, as such, the statement is absolutely privileged. The trial court agreed and concluded in its order of dismissal that "the statement ... is merely a statement of opinion and therefore not actionable. Such utterances are protected by the First Amendment." In reaching that conclusion, the trial court presumably relied upon Defendants' citation to Jamerson v. Anderson Newspapers, Inc., 469 N.E.2d 1243 (Ind.Ct.App.1984), in which we held that statements that are "opinionative and not factual ... cannot constitute falsehoods" and, thus, "are absolutely protected...