Southern Air Transport, Inc. v. Post-Newsweek Stations, Florida, Inc., POST-NEWSWEEK

• Decision Date: 08 May 1990
• Docket Number: No. 89-59,POST-NEWSWEEK,89-59
• Citation: 568 So.2d 927
• Parties: 15 Fla. L. Weekly D1290 SOUTHERN AIR TRANSPORT, INC., Appellant, v.STATIONS, FLORIDA, INC., d/b/a WPLG Television, and Susan Candiotti, Marcia Izaguirre, John Terenzio, G. William Ryan, and L. Stanley Paige, Appellees.
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals

Page 927

568 So.2d 927

15 Fla. L. Weekly D1290

SOUTHERN AIR TRANSPORT, INC., Appellant, v. POST-NEWSWEEK STATIONS, FLORIDA, INC., d/b/a WPLG Television, and Susan Candiotti, Marcia Izaguirre, John Terenzio, G. William Ryan, and L. Stanley Paige, Appellees.

No. 89-59.

District Court of Appeal of Florida Third District.

May 8, 1990.

Rehearing and Rehearing En Banc Denied Nov. 13, 1990.

Beckman & Kirstein and Robert M. Beckman, Washington, D.C., and Dwight Sullivan, Miami, for appellant.

Steel Hector & Davis and Donald M. Middlebrooks and Thomas R. Julin and Norman Davis, Miami, for appellees.

Before SCHWARTZ, C.J., and HUBBART and JORGENSON, JJ.

PER CURIAM.

This is an appeal by the plaintiff Southern Air Transport, Inc. from an adverse final summary judgment entered below in a libel action. After thoroughly reviewing the extensive record in this case, we affirm in part and reverse in part based on the following briefly stated legal analysis.

First, we conclude that the trial court was correct in finding, as a matter of law, that the plaintiff was a limited public figure and, consequently, could not recover in the instant libel action unless it satisfied the New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964), "actual malice" standard. Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., 418 U.S. 323, 345, 94 S.Ct. 2997, 3009, 41 L.Ed.2d 789, 808 (1974). We reach this result because the record below demonstrates, without material dispute, that (1) there was an ongoing public controversy at the time of the alleged libel concerning the corruption and illegality involved in the so-called Iran-Contra scandal wherein arms and supply shipments were covertly diverted to the Nicaraguan Contras in 1985-86 in alleged violation of a congressional ban on such arms and shipments, (2) the plaintiff was a major operative in the entire Nicaraguan Contra supply network and, as such, reasonably invited public attention as to its role therein, (3) when its covert role became publicly known and the media sought it out, the plaintiff hired a public relations firm and attempted to influence the outcome of the aforesaid public controversy by claiming that it was involved in normal, routine commercial activity, rather than serving as a covert arm of the CIA, and (4) the alleged libel was germane to the plaintiff's role in the alleged illegal, corrupt, and covert shipment of arms to the Nicaraguan Contras. See, e.g., Waldbaum v. Fairchild Publications, Inc., 627 F.2d 1287, 1297-98 (D.C.Cir.), cert. denied, 449 U.S. 898, 101 S.Ct. 266, 66 L.Ed.2d 128 (1980); McDowell v. Paiewonsky, 769 F.2d 942 (3d Cir.1985); Dombey v. Phoenix Newspapers, Inc., 150 Ariz. 476, 484-85, 724 P.2d 562, 570-71 (1986).

Second, we conclude, contrary to the trial court's finding, that the plaintiff produced sufficient evidence below upon which a reasonable trier of fact could find by clear and convincing evidence that the defendants [Post-Newsweek Stations, et al.] uttered a defamatory falsehood against the plaintiff--namely, that the plaintiff was involved in drug trafficking in Latin America--with "actual malice," i.e., with knowledge that such accusation was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not. Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 255-56, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 2574, 91 L.Ed.2d 202, 216 (1986); New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 279-80, 84 S.Ct. 710, 726, 11 L.Ed.2d 686, 706 (1964); Lampkin-Asam v. Miami Daily News, 408 So.2d 666, 668 (Fla. 3d DCA 1981), rev. denied, 417 So.2d 329 (Fla.1982), cert. denied, 459 U.S. 806, 103 S.Ct. 29, 74 L.Ed.2d 44 (1982). We reach this result because there is evidence in this record tending to show that: (1) the defendants aired an investigative television news show in which a silhouetted, unidentified informer was shown accusing the plaintiff of drug trafficking while engaged in its covert arm shipments to the Nicaraguan Contras, stating that the plaintiff allegedly received illegal drugs in exchange for arms at an airport in Colombia; (2) the credibility of this informer was greatly suspect because (a...