Palm Beach Newspapers, Inc. v. Early

• Decision Date: 23 April 1976
• Docket Number: Nos. 75--116 and 74--1729,s. 75--116 and 74--1729
• Citation: 334 So.2d 50
• Parties: PALM BEACH NEWSPAPERS, INC., a Florida Corporation, et al., Appellants, v. Lloyd F. EARLY, Appellee.
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals

Page 50

334 So.2d 50

PALM BEACH NEWSPAPERS, INC., a Florida Corporation, et al., Appellants, v. Lloyd F. EARLY, Appellee.

Nos. 75--116 and 74--1729.

District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fourth District.

April 23, 1976.

Rehearing Denied June 2, 1976.

Harold B. Wahl, of Wahl & Gabel, Jacksonville, Cecil H. Albury, of Brennan, McAliley, Albury & Hayskar, West Palm Beach, and John F. Law, North Palm Beach, for appellants.

Joseph D. Farish, Jr., of Farish & Farish, West Palm Beach, for appellee.

PER CURIAM.

Lloyd F. Early, the elected County Superintendent of Public Instruction of Palm Beach County, brought an action for libel against Palm Beach Newspapers, Inc., the publisher of two daily newspapers, and certain members of the editorial and news staff of those two newspapers. A jury verdict awarded Early a total of $1,000,000 in compensatory and punitive damages, and from the judgment entered thereon the defendants have appealed. This is Case No. 74--1729. The trial had been delayed for nearly two years while defendants sought certiorari review of an order requiring the corporate defendant to disclose certain financial information. Defendants had posted a bond conditioned to pay all costs and damages occasioned by the delay. Subsequent to verdict and final judgment, plaintiff sought to recover on the bond asserting entitlement to two years' interest on the judgment as his damages for the delay. The postjudgment order denying plaintiff's motion and granting the defendants' motion to discharge the bond is the subject of an interlocutory appeal, Case No. 75--116. We affirm the latter order, and, for reasons hereafter set forth, reverse the judgment in Case No. 74--1729.

At all times material to this cause of action, Lloyd F. Early was a public official. The corporate defendant published two daily newspapers in Palm Beach County, the Palm Beach Post, a morning paper, and the Palm Beach Times, an evening paper. Defendants-Favre and Sawyer were editor and reporter respectively for the Post, defendants-Kirkpatrick and Arpe editor and reporter respectively for the Times. Both papers, through their respective editorial and news staffs, embarked upon a concerted campaign admittedly designed to bring about the removal of Mr. Early from his elected position. In pursuance of this objective, the defendants published over a period of approximately fourteen months several hundred news articles and editorials, all of which were generally hostile to or critical of Early and many of which were of a defamatory nature.

Although the defendant/appellants have raised a number of points on this appeal, we find merit only as to those relating to (1) the sufficiency of the evidence, (2) the correctness of certain jury instructions, and (3) the gross excessiveness of the verdict. However, because we conclude that the evidence is legally insufficient to sustain the verdict and the judgment entered thereon, we dispose of the case on that point alone, making it unnecessary to discuss the remaining meritorious points.

This case is governed squarely by New York Times Company v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964) and its progeny. In the New York Times case, the court defined a constitutional privilege intended to free criticism of public officials from the restraints imposed by the common law of defamation:

'The constitutional guarantees require, we think, a federal rule that prohibits a public official from recovering damages for a defamatory falsehood relating to his official conduct unless he proves that the statement was made with 'actual malice'--that is, with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.'

(376 U.S. at 279--80, 84 S.Ct. at 726)

This standard, applicable to appellee--Lloyd F. Early as a public officer, has been explicated in later cases. In Garrison v. Louisiana, 379 U.S. 64, it was said, at 74, 85 S.Ct. 209, at 216, 13 L.Ed.2d 125 (1964) 'only those false statements made with the high degree of awareness of their probable falsity demanded by New York Times may be the subject of either civil or criminal sanctions.' As stated in a footnote in Gertz v. Rober Welsh, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, footnote 6 at 334, 94 S.Ct. 2997,

3004, 41 L.Ed.2d 789 (1974):

'In St. Amant v. Thompson, 390 U.S. 727, 731, 88 S.Ct. 1323, 1325, 20 L.Ed.2d 262 (1968), the Court equated reckless disregard of the truth with subjective awareness of probable falsity: 'There must be sufficient evidence to permit the conclusion that the defendant in fact entertained serious doubts as to the truth of his publication.''

Malice in the traditional common law sense of sinister or corrupt motive such as hatred, ill will, spite, enmity or a wanton desire to injure has been distinguished from actual malice as employed in the New York Times standard relating to a public official--knowledge of falsity or reckless disregard of the truth. See, Beckley Newspapers Corp. v. Hanks, 389 U.S. 81, 88 S.Ct. 197, 19 L.Ed.2d 248 (1967); Garrison v. Louisiana, supra; Henry v. Collins, 380 U.S. 356, 85 S.Ct. 992, 13 L.Ed.2d 892 (1965); Rosenblatt v. Baer, 383 U.S. 75, 84, 86 S.Ct. 669, 15 L.Ed.2d 597 (1966); Greenbelt Cooperative Publishing Ass'n, Inc. v. Bresler, 398 U.S. 6, 9--11, 90 S.Ct. 1537, 26 L.Ed.2d 6 (1970). Additionally, it has been stated that those who hold governmental office may recover for injury to reputation only on clear and convincing proof that the defamatory falsehood was made with knowledge of its falsity or with reckless disregard for the truth. Gertz v. Robert Welsh, Inc., supra, 418 U.S. at 342, 94 S.Ct. 2997.

The Gertz case, supra, also made clear that the defamatory falsehood referred to in the New York Times standard refers to a statement of fact as opposed to pure comment or opinion:

'We begin with the common ground. 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. But there is no constitutional value in false statements of fact.' (418 U.S. at 339--40, 94 S.Ct. at 3007)

It thus appears that under the present state of the law concerning an action for libel by a public official, the plaintiff has the burden of showing by clear and convincing evidence that the defamatory statement was (1) a statement of fact, (2) which was false, and (3) made with 'actual malice'--that is, with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not. We conclude from our...