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Can You Be Sued for What You Write in a Letter

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  • 05-15-2014, 01:59 PM
    JasonJ
    Can You Be Sued for What You Write in a Letter
    My question involves defamation in the state of: Hawaii

    Hello,

    My question is, if you are writing a private letter to a company and you say that they are an unethical and corrupt company (I truly believe that), is it considered slander?

    Thank you,
    JasonJ
  • 05-15-2014, 02:12 PM
    cbg
    Re: Over a Letter
    Are you telling Company A that you believe they are unethical and corrupt?

    Or are you telling Company B that you believe Company A is unethical and corrupt?
  • 05-15-2014, 03:21 PM
    Welfarelvr
    Re: Can You Be Sued for What You Write in a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting JasonJ
    View Post
    My question involves defamation in the state of: Hawaii

    Hello,

    My question is, if you are writing a private letter to a company and you say that they are an unethical and corrupt company (I truly believe that), is it considered slander?

    Thank you,
    JasonJ

    The person who reads the letter is not the "corporation", so that could be considered publication. But, since there are unlikely to be damages for such a statement, I think it unlikely you would be sued. It is when statements are widely publicized that a corporation suffers damages and, even if they do not, they will sometimes sue to remove the statement. (aka SLAPP)

    But, if you want a specific, legal, answer to your question if this is on a test, "no".
  • 05-15-2014, 05:09 PM
    JasonJ
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting cbg
    View Post
    Are you telling Company A that you believe they are unethical and corrupt?

    Or are you telling Company B that you believe Company A is unethical and corrupt?

    I am telling Company A that they are unethical and corrupt.
  • 05-15-2014, 05:51 PM
    cbg
    Re: Over a Letter
    That is not defamation, then.
  • 05-15-2014, 07:36 PM
    Welfarelvr
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting cbg
    View Post
    That is not defamation, then.

    The legal issue is publication. It is clear the "corporation" is not a person. The person who reads is a person and I think publication would be made.

    Pretend the OP had some lie that would cause all the employees to quit, causing the corporation damages. I believe the letter would fulfill the publication to a third party element of defamation. Even though the letter was sent to the corporation. Even though the corporation designated the person to read it.

    Not a lot of case law on the matter. But, the key here is damages, not publication.
  • 05-15-2014, 08:01 PM
    cbg
    Re: Over a Letter
    No, the key here is whether the elements of defamation have been met. They have not been met if the only entity he makes the statement to is the entity itself.

    It is questionable if they would have been met even if there had been a third party since he is expressing an opinion, but if only one entity is involved defamation and all its variants are right off the table.
  • 05-16-2014, 06:21 AM
    eerelations
    Re: Over a Letter
    OP, if you are doing this because you are a disgruntled employee of Company A, please keep in mind that Company A will be legally free to share the contents of your letter with any future prospective employers of yours.
  • 05-16-2014, 06:39 AM
    budwad
    Re: Can You Be Sued for What You Write in a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting Welfarelvr
    View Post
    The person who reads the letter is not the "corporation", so that could be considered publication.

    I'm going to disagree with you on this. An employee of a corporation is an agent of the corporation. Under common law the acts of the agent are the acts of the corporation. An employee who is authorized to open and read mail is doing so for the corporation.

    Whoever acts through another does the act himself.
  • 05-16-2014, 09:56 AM
    Welfarelvr
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting cbg
    View Post
    No, the key here is whether the elements of defamation have been met. They have not been met if the only entity he makes the statement to is the entity itself.

    It is questionable if they would have been met even if there had been a third party since he is expressing an opinion, but if only one entity is involved defamation and all its variants are right off the table.

    One of the elements of defamation is publication. An agent of a person is not the person. From an old Prosser on Torts:
    Quote:

    There may be publication to any third person. It may be made to a member of the plaintiff's family, including his wife, or to the plaintiff's agent or employee. It may be made to the defendant's own agent, employee or officer, even where the defendant is a corporation. The dictation of defamatory matter to a stenographer generally is regarded as sufficient publication, althoug it may be privileged. A few courts, with a tendency to confuse the question of publication with that of privilege, have held that it is not, regarding dictation as an indespensable method in modern business transactions, and therefore merely equivalent to the defendant's own writing.
    Calling a person unethical and corrupt, while an opinion, assumes actual facts. While it would certainly be argued that the OP was only expressing an opinion, unless it did not refer to anything else more specific, it would be considered defamatory and not mere opinion. If it was simply saying "unethical and corrupt" (As in "corporation is a stinkyhead".) then the corp would really, really not care and there would be nothing even resembling damages.

    A good argument for the OP might be the corporation is "public" by its nature and they would need to prove actual malice under New York Times v. Sullivan to win. That would be hard if the OP was simply writing to the corporation on what he felt to be a matter of public concern.
  • 05-16-2014, 10:22 AM
    cbg
    Re: Over a Letter
    OP feels that the company is unethical and corrupt. He writes a letter to the CEO of the company telling him that the company is unethical and corrupt.

    Where is the publication?
  • 05-16-2014, 10:36 AM
    Welfarelvr
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting cbg
    View Post
    OP feels that the company is unethical and corrupt. He writes a letter to the CEO of the company telling him that the company is unethical and corrupt.

    Where is the publication?

    The CEO is not the corporation.
  • 05-16-2014, 10:43 AM
    cbg
    Re: Over a Letter
    So, who are YOU anticipating that he would be writing the letter to?
  • 05-16-2014, 11:04 AM
    Welfarelvr
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting cbg
    View Post
    So, who are YOU anticipating that he would be writing the letter to?

    To XYZ corporation. But, that does not change the fact he expected someone to read it. That is publication to a third party.
  • 05-16-2014, 11:09 AM
    cbg
    Re: Over a Letter
    You are completely clueless.

    Okay, let's go at it this way. For purpose of this question, who is the corporation?
  • 05-16-2014, 11:51 AM
    Welfarelvr
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting cbg
    View Post
    You are completely clueless.

    Okay, let's go at it this way. For purpose of this question, who is the corporation?

    Again with the insults? Sigh.

    Before we go through silly games, do you know what Prosser on Torts is? (Actually, Prosser and Keeton on Torts".) It is called a Hornbook. It is often referenced in cases where the basic law is needed to be stated. For the specific cases (not precidential in HI) referenced for the quote applicable here:

    Duke of Brunswick v. Harmer, 1849, 14 Q.B.D. 185, 53 L.J.Q.B. 20
    Brown V. Elm City Lumber Co., 1914, 167 N.C. 9, 82 S.E. 961

    So you can see it has been so for a very long time.

    To answer your question, a "corporation" is not a "who", it is a what.

    From (http://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/vi...context=wmborj)

    Quote:

    Defamation law is designed to protect reputation "in the popular sense," that
    which diminishes "the esteem, respect, goodwill or confidence in which the plaintiff
    is held."'3 7 The traditional definition of reputation, however, concerns the personal
    and emotional consequences of false speech.' In Gertz, the Court stated explicitly
    that defamation law exists to protect "the essential dignity and worth of every
    human being. '
    Corporations are incapable of suffering the reputational injury that defamation
    law seeks to redress. The corporation is a "artificial being ... existing only in
    contemplation of law.""Iw A corporation does not have social relationships and
    cannot suffer the same emotions that a natural person may suffer.'6' They do not
    have a private life. 62 Nor do they have a purely personal reputation.' 63 Moreover,
    the reputation of a corporation is not directly attributable to any natural person. The
    separation of management control and shareholder ownership "place[s] the
    shareholder at a greater emotional and legal distance from an allegedly defamatory
    publication concerning the corporation."'" In essence, corporations do not have a
    "character to be affected" by defamation. 165
    While they cannot be personally harmed, corporations may have a property
    interest in their reputations, an intangible asset akin to good will. 11 At common
    law, a corporation can recover for insults to its reputation for "financial soundness,
    efficiency, credit, management, or other matters affecting business reputation."'67
    Corporations may stand to lose substantial amounts of wealth if their corporate
    name is tarnished. 6 The concept of reputation as a property interest, however, is
    problematic in the defamation law context. First, the Supreme Court has been
    unwilling to recognize a heightened constitutional interest based on that party's
    economic position.'69 Second, because defamation law is based on personal
    reputational interests, it allows for a "substantial verdict for the plaintiff without
    any proof of actual harm to reputation."''I A corporate plaintiff thus puts
    "defamation law in the business of compensating individuals for harms which, from
    the perspective of reputation as property, may well be nonexistent."'' Third, unfair
    trade practices, product disparagement suits, and market controls diminish the
    chances of corporate loss to reputation. " Finally, corporations have unique access
    to the channels of communication in order to launch countervailing speech in
    response to defamatory falsehoods."
    Because the reputation of a corporation is not the same type of reputation as
    that of a natural person, defamation law is not well-served by treating personal and
    corporate reputations as equivalent. As corporations cannot suffer personal
    reputation injury, "corporations as a class are less deserving of reputational
    protection than individuals.".

  • 05-16-2014, 11:58 AM
    cbg
    Re: Over a Letter
    Exactly.

    Have you read the above quote?
  • 05-16-2014, 12:40 PM
    Welfarelvr
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting cbg
    View Post
    Exactly.

    Have you read the above quote?

    I both read and understand it. Do you?

    Is it your claim a corporation cannot win a suit for defamation? Perhaps you should lay out your theory. Before you state something based on a snippet, you might want to read the entire article.
  • 05-16-2014, 12:44 PM
    LawResearcherMissy
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Again with the insults?
    No, she's right. You're seriously lacking in clue.

    Writing a letter to a company to tell them they suck is not publication to a third party, any more than writing a letter to you to tell you that you suck is publication to a third party.

    It's time for you to be quiet on this topic, because you have no idea what you're talking about.

    JasonJ, the answer to your question of "Can they sue" is "Yes, they can sue." You can be sued because your neighbor doesn't like the color of your house. You can be sued because your bank teller hates your shoes. Anyone can sue anyone for anything. All "sue" means is "ask the courts to settle an argument".

    You're asking the wrong question. The question you should be asking is "Can they win?", and the answer to that is NO.

    It's not defamation to tell a company what you think of them.
  • 05-16-2014, 01:17 PM
    quincy
    Re: Can You Be Sued for What You Write in a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting JasonJ
    View Post
    My question involves defamation in the state of: Hawaii

    Hello,

    My question is, if you are writing a private letter to a company and you say that they are an unethical and corrupt company (I truly believe that), is it considered slander?

    Thank you,
    JasonJ

    First in answer to your title question: Yes, you can be sued for what you write in a letter. But you would not be sued for "slander." Slander is the oral or spoken form of defamation. Libel is its written form.

    That said, unless in the private letter to the company you singled out a specific person or specific people as being unethical or corrupt, the private letter to the company could not be the basis of a successful defamation claim. You have caused no harm to the reputation of the company.
  • 05-16-2014, 01:35 PM
    Welfarelvr
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting LawResearcherMissy
    View Post
    No, she's right. You're seriously lacking in clue.

    Writing a letter to a company to tell them they suck is not publication to a third party, any more than writing a letter to you to tell you that you suck is publication to a third party.

    It's time for you to be quiet on this topic, because you have no idea what you're talking about.

    JasonJ, the answer to your question of "Can they sue" is "Yes, they can sue." You can be sued because your neighbor doesn't like the color of your house. You can be sued because your bank teller hates your shoes. Anyone can sue anyone for anything. All "sue" means is "ask the courts to settle an argument".

    You're asking the wrong question. The question you should be asking is "Can they win?", and the answer to that is NO.

    It's not defamation to tell a company what you think of them.

    Perhaps you should do some of that Law Research and find a cite. As I already have. If you are in a law office, pick up a Hornbook and see the black letter law on the matter. Since the law has been that way from the turn of the century, I don't see any modern cases easily accessible. With your skills, I'm sure you can come up with something.

    The company is not the person. An employee of the company is not the company. Say I go to a person and call them a stinkyhead and did not know anyone else is around. But, just as I said it the parish priest entered the room and he hates stinkyheads and excommunicates the person. Did I publish the defamatory term? (Assume it is false and defamatory etc. We're talking about publication.) Say I put an unsealed envelope on stinkyheads desk and someone else comes in and reads it, was it published? Let's say the OP calls the corporation stinkyheads and the employee reading the letter shows it to the press who publishes it without authorization. Who are the publishers, just the press and employee or also the OP?

    Now, I agree the priest issue is one that is closer as accidental or non-negligent publication is not one that generally leads to liability. There, words spoken with no reason to suppose that anyone but the plaintiff would overhear them, or a sealed letter sent to the plaintiff himself which is unexpectedly opened and read by another would not be either. Note "unexpectedly". The person the letter would be sent to in this case IS NOT THE CORPORATION. He might be an employee of the corp, or an agent of the corp, but it is not the corp. There is publication.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote:

    Quoting quincy
    View Post
    First in answer to your title question: Yes, you can be sued for what you write in a letter. But you would not be sued for "slander." Slander is the oral or spoken form of defamation. Libel is its written form.

    That said, unless in the private letter to the company you singled out a specific person or specific people as being unethical or corrupt, the private letter to the company could not be the basis of a successful defamation claim. You have caused no harm to the reputation of the company.

    The lack of harm is a separate question and I have already mentioned that repeatedly. However, say there are damages. Was the letter to the company published?
  • 05-16-2014, 01:41 PM
    jk
    Re: Can You Be Sued for What You Write in a Letter
    suggesting that a company can actually read its own mail and by allowing or directing the ceo or other employee of the company to read the company's mail amounts to publishing it is just downright funny.

    shame on the company for making the ceo read its mail.

    bad company. shame, shame, shame
  • 05-16-2014, 01:43 PM
    aardvarc
    Re: Over a Letter
    No, the letter to the company was NOT published. It was sent to THE COMPANY. The employee opening the mail, the person who carts it around the building, and the CEO or any OTHER employee who reads it all have one thing in common: the ARE "the company". There is NO publication here. Any more than if I write you a letter and your wife opens it. It wasn't PUBLISHED to her, either, even though as your spouse she's technically a separate person.
  • 05-16-2014, 02:08 PM
    Welfarelvr
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting aardvarc
    View Post
    No, the letter to the company was NOT published. It was sent to THE COMPANY. The employee opening the mail, the person who carts it around the building, and the CEO or any OTHER employee who reads it all have one thing in common: the ARE "the company". There is NO publication here. Any more than if I write you a letter and your wife opens it. It wasn't PUBLISHED to her, either, even though as your spouse she's technically a separate person.

    The sealed letter to me and my wife opens it, I agree. If you gave an opened envelope to my wife for me, no.

    Wenman v. Ash, 1853 13 C.B. 836
    Tgeaker v. Richardson, 1962 1 All Eng. 229
    Schenck v. Schenck, 1843 20 N.J.L. 208
    Luick V. Driscoll, 1895, 13 Ind.App. 279
    Bonkowski v. Arlan's Department Store, 1970, 383 Mich. 90

    You see that "technically" a separate person is more than a mere technicality. It is a legal truth. A wife is not her husband.

    If the employees ARE "the company" can someone steal from themselves? Or, is the company "technically" separate from the employee?

    ------------------------
    The closest issue I can see here in modern HI law is through the concept of "self-publication".

    When a person communicates defamatory statements only to the person defamed, who then repeats the statements to others, the publication of the statements by the person defamed will not support a defamation action against the originator of the statements. I suppose that is what is being argued here. The corporation has "self-published" the letter it received by turning it over to a person to read. Some minority of states (Not Hawaii) have created an exception when the plaintiff is effectively compelled to publish the defamatory material.

    Gonsalves v. Nissan Motor in Hawaii, 58 P.3d 1196, (Haw: Supreme Court 2002)

    While we can compare and contrast that, I don't think anyone can legitimately argue there was no publication.

    ------------------------
    Even with a sealed letter, there has been liability found if the defendant knows, or should know, that plaintiff's spouse or secretary is in the habit of reading plaintiff's mail, or in the circumstances would likely read it, and the words are in fact read by such person.
    Rumney v. Worthley, 186 Mass. 144 (1904)
    Roberts v. English Mfg. Co., 155 Ala. 414 (1908)
    Theaker v. Richardson [1962], 1 All E.R. 229
  • 05-16-2014, 02:33 PM
    aardvarc
    Re: Over a Letter
    We HAVE legitimately argued such. Re-read what it means "to publish". Writing a letter ABOUT a company TO the company, or it's agents, isn't publication.
  • 05-16-2014, 02:35 PM
    jk
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting aardvarc
    View Post
    We HAVE legitimately argued such. Re-read what it means "to publish". Writing a letter ABOUT a company TO the company, or it's agents, isn't publication.


    (psssst, he doesn't stop even when you have proven him to be wrong. In fact, even if he admits he is wrong he may still argue he is right)
  • 05-16-2014, 02:47 PM
    Welfarelvr
    Re: Can You Be Sued for What You Write in a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting jk
    View Post
    suggesting that a company can actually read its own mail and by allowing or directing the ceo or other employee of the company to read the company's mail amounts to publishing it is just downright funny.

    shame on the company for making the ceo read its mail.

    bad company. shame, shame, shame

    Just can't ignore me, can you? The best part was how you tried in some other threads to reply without really replying. Yet, the structure of the response followed my own. Good times indeed.

    Quote:

    (psssst, he doesn't stop even when you have proven him to be wrong. In fact, even if he admits he is wrong he may still argue he is right)
    It is especially funny when people who just say things without citations consider themselves to have "proved" me wrong. Even though I'm the only one making legal arguments.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote:

    Quoting aardvarc
    View Post
    We HAVE legitimately argued such. Re-read what it means "to publish". Writing a letter ABOUT a company TO the company, or it's agents, isn't publication.

    Sorry, wrong again. Please read the thread from the beginning. Publishing to agents IS publication.

    There are some links on Google if you seek the previously cited:
    Brown V. Elm City Lumber Co., 1914, 167 N.C. 9, 82 S.E. 961

    http://goo.gl/0B5ugw (Will take you to the old case.)
  • 05-16-2014, 04:29 PM
    LawResearcherMissy
    Re: Can You Be Sued for What You Write in a Letter
    What part of "It's time for you to be quiet on this topic because you have no idea what you're talking about" was unclear to you?

    Out you go.
  • 05-16-2014, 08:14 PM
    aardvarc
    Re: Can You Be Sued for What You Write in a Letter
    I don't care HOW many cites one cares to throw up - if they're INACCURATE or INAPPLICABLE....'nuff said. =)
  • 05-16-2014, 08:47 PM
    Bubba Jimmy
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Quoting LawResearcherMissy
    View Post
    No, she's right. You're seriously lacking in clue.

    Not only that, he sounds like a torts class flunk-out. I can't imagine a more convoluted interpretation of a legal principle than this topic. Let's hope he's not actually a lawyer that gives people real advice based on his misunderstanding of his Posner hornbook.
  • 05-16-2014, 09:10 PM
    LawResearcherMissy
    Re: Over a Letter
    Quote:

    Let's hope he's not actually a lawyer that gives people real advice based on his misunderstanding of his Posner hornbook.
    He's somebody else's problem, now.

    The vast majority of y'all work really hard to provide factual information, which is greatly appreciated by the people who come to us for help. He...didn't.
  • 05-17-2014, 03:13 AM
    Bubba Jimmy
    Re: Over a Letter
    At least I try to shut up when somebody shows me where I'm wrong, even if I can't admit it (which I try to do unless I remain unconvinced). ;-)
  • 05-17-2014, 05:53 AM
    Mr. Knowitall
    Re: Over a Letter
    Let's go back a bit. There is ample authority that if I defame a person, the fact that I publish the defamation to that person's agent or employee does not mean that the communication is not published. Welfarelvr cited Brown v. Elm City Lumber Co., 167 N.C. 9, 82 S.E. 961 (1914), which involved the determination of whether a communication directed to the plaintiff's attorney could support a defamation claim. In that case the court determined that it could not: the court found that the allegedly defamatory letter was a legitimate answer to an inquiry or claim from the plaintiff's attorney, that more latitude" is allowed in the response to an inquiry by the plaintiff's agent, thus finding that the letter was covered by qualified privilege despite having been "published" to the lawyer. Another example is where a plaintiff asks somebody to make an inquiry (e.g., to a former employee) and then attempts to sue over the reply. There is a lot of case law indicating that if you invite the statement, even through a third party agent to whom it is ostensibly published, you cannot sustain a defamation action over the statement you invited -- even if the same statement would be actionable if obtained by an independent third party, such as an actual prospective employer. Similarly, if an employee brings a union rep to a disciplinary hearing, the employee cannot sustain a defamation action by claiming that the allegations underlying the disciplinary action were published to the union rep.

    There is also ample case law involving corporations in which claims of publication within a corporation were held to fail due to the nature of and need for the communication within an organization. A supervisor can talk to the department manager about employee conduct without being deemed to have "published" that information to the manager. In other areas of law there is ample case law establishing how, within certain parameters, an employee cannot be distinguished from a corporation. For example, if an employee is fired based upon a report or recommendation of her supervisor, she cannot sustain an action for tortious interference with contract against the supervisor because an employee acting within the scope of employment is not a third party to a contract between the employer and another person.

    I gave the old college try to trying to find a case where a corporation claimed that its own employee was a "third party" for purposes of publication, in relation to a defamation action brought by the corporation, but I came up empty. I wasn't surprised that I didn't find a case. If you extrapolate the case law addressing defamatory statements about an individual, made to their agent or employee, to corporations, you're placing the corporation in the extraordinary position in which it can claim that any allegedly defamatory statement about it is published as every person within the corporation would be a "third person". Such a theory would also undermine the corporation's historic defense to defamation claims arising from internal discussions, that the parties to the discussion could not be deemed "third persons" due to the nature of corporations and the need for internal communication.

    If anybody can actually come up with a case in which a business claimed that defamatory statements about it were published to a third person, with that third person being the employee assigned to receive and review incoming mail or phone calls, I would love to read it.
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