That's a big pay day. Fortunately for the feds there's probably enough IRS agents that one of them can hand deliver the settlement and rake him over the coals while they're there.

Rapier108 said:

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Needs to happen more often because the Democrats live for the politics of personal destruction.

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Both parties do it. Bread and circuses.

This is what happens to society when little kids aren't allowed to police themselves on the playground.

Toss in couple of butt kickings when young and people start realizing they don't want their braces knocked through their lips-- so they keep their pie hole shut.

Moore was a grotesque candidate, but I'm glad he won this case.

In a nasty bit of media malpractice, they stayed quiet about Moore's alleged scandals until after he won the GOP nomination.

After he was the GOP candidate, they let loose. And Alabama - Alambama! - elected a Dem to the senate.

Grotesque? A bit dramatic, no?

Desantis is untested for the lies that will be used in election.

Reversed on appeal.
https://media.ca11.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/files/202313531.pdf

Not an attorney but help me out here.

I'm interpreting this as the 11th Circuit reviewed the trial record de novo and found the jury verdict was erroneous based on the appellate court's personal interpretations of the evidence. They weren't sitting in the courtroom. They didn't observe the witnesses. They read the record and determined the jury got it wrong. It seems like this sort of reversal should only happen in extreme circumstances.

The jury was instructed on the public figure standard and what actual malice means. The jury made the determination there was actual malice.

I haven't gotten through the court's analysis of the evidence yet but I'm having a hard time with courts doing this. It's a long ruling and it's possible I may end up agreeing with them once I'm done but I just don't like juries being reversed in this way. Feels icky.

ErnestEndeavor said:

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Not an attorney but help me out here.

I'm interpreting this as the 11th Circuit reviewed the trial record de novo and found the jury verdict was erroneous based on the appellate court's personal interpretations of the evidence. They weren't sitting in the courtroom. They didn't observe the witnesses. They read the record and determined the jury got it wrong. It seems like this sort of reversal should only happen in extreme circumstances.

The jury was instructed on the public figure standard and what actual malice means. The jury made the determination there was actual malice.

I haven't gotten through the court's analysis of the evidence yet but I'm having a hard time with courts doing this. It's a long ruling and it's possible I may end up agreeing with them once I'm done but I just don't like juries being reversed in this way. Feels icky.

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From skimming it, it looks like the court is saying that they think it was fine for SMP to imply something defamatory because they cited the articles they used to fact check the story, none of which included any evidence that what they were implying happened. The court states that they think it was just a poor choice of wording by SMP and not a deliberate attempt to defame.

All of which is complete BS to me. If SMP had asked for a trial by judge, and the judge made that decision, fine. But when a jury considered those facts and came to a different decision, it seems wildly inappropriate for an appeals court to substitute their own opinion for that of the jury who heard the case.

That's the way I'm looking at it too. The jury heard all of that.

If we are going to have jury trials and have juries decide what the facts are, it has to be something pretty darn egregious for an appellate court to decide that the jury got the facts wrong. Maybe that's what happened here. Maybe no reasonable jury could have ruled in favor of Moore given the facts and perhaps some local hometown bias kicked in. This was Alabama state court in a very friendly jury pool for Moore.

But of course when it's somebody like Trump being sued for defamation in New York he would never get this kind of benefit of the doubt from an appellate court. "The jury has spoken" would rule the day.

ErnestEndeavor said:

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That's the way I'm looking at it too. The jury heard all of that.

If we are going to have jury trials and have juries decide what the facts are, it has to be something pretty darn egregious for an appellate court to decide that the jury got the facts wrong. Maybe that's what happened here. Maybe no reasonable jury could have ruled in favor of Moore given the facts and perhaps some local hometown bias kicked in. This was Alabama state court in a very friendly jury pool for Moore.

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A jury of your peers is a jury of your peers...

ErnestEndeavor said:

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Not an attorney but help me out here.

I'm interpreting this as the 11th Circuit reviewed the trial record de novo and found the jury verdict was erroneous based on the appellate court's personal interpretations of the evidence. They weren't sitting in the courtroom. They didn't observe the witnesses. They read the record and determined the jury got it wrong. It seems like this sort of reversal should only happen in extreme circumstances.

The jury was instructed on the public figure standard and what actual malice means. The jury made the determination there was actual malice.

I haven't gotten through the court's analysis of the evidence yet but I'm having a hard time with courts doing this. It's a long ruling and it's possible I may end up agreeing with them once I'm done but I just don't like juries being reversed in this way. Feels icky.

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SMP moved as a matter of law that Moore's motion should be denied. Moore was not arguing that two of the three frames were false, because they weren't. His argument was that the two combined created something defamatory. This case really turns on actual malice. SCOTUS has said that appellate courts are to review if the actual malice standard has been met as a matter of law. That's why they get to review it.

ErnestEndeavor said:

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But of course when it's somebody like Trump being sued for defamation in New York he would never get this kind of benefit of the doubt from an appellate court. "The jury has spoken" would rule the day.

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This is a word salad of misunderstanding the law.

txags92 said:

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ErnestEndeavor said:

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That's the way I'm looking at it too. The jury heard all of that.

If we are going to have jury trials and have juries decide what the facts are, it has to be something pretty darn egregious for an appellate court to decide that the jury got the facts wrong. Maybe that's what happened here. Maybe no reasonable jury could have ruled in favor of Moore given the facts and perhaps some local hometown bias kicked in. This was Alabama state court in a very friendly jury pool for Moore.

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A jury of your peers is a jury of your peers...

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That is English common law, not American. Stems from the royal class refusing to have commoners on their juries. The only "peer" we have in the US is someone on the voter roll for that locality. That's it.

Never mind I think I got it now.

These days a jury of my "peers" is a terrifying prospect. My law is a bit more complicated so most of my cases are bench trials. I couldn't imagine "peers" determining one's criminal fate.

Queso1 said:

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These days a jury of my "peers" is a terrifying prospect. My law is a bit more complicated so most of my cases are bench trials. I couldn't imagine "peers" determining one's criminal fate.

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Yeah...

"Peers" is too entirely nebulous...