From the New York Law Journal, this brief note about the defamation lawsuit against journalist Michael Lewis: it was dismissed. Again. Apparently this decision below was the plaintiff’s appeal from the trial court’s earlier decision to dismiss.
If you read the various posts about this lawsuit, you’ll understand that a journalist can opine harshly about a subject. Being nasty about a subject is not defamation. Lewis was free, according to Judge Daniels, to express his critical opinion.
It all comes down to what my boss once told me: “Anybody can sue anybody for anything.” I’ve said this a number of times before, and have added, “But anybody can get his case dismissed and can, if the accused person is pissed off enough, could find himself paying all the legal costs.
Circuit: ‘The Big Short’ Scribe Did Not Defame CDO Manager
By Mark Hamblett, New York Law Journal
Libel claims were correctly dismissed against author Michael Lewis, who portrayed a manager of collateralized debt obligations as a symbol of subprime mortgage market corruption and the 2008 financial collapse, a federal appeals court has ruled.