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    Default Re: Suing Police and FBI for Defamation

    What you will want to do is to try to correct the erroneous records.

    If you try to sue based on the facts you've given so far, you will run squarely into a brick wall called "sovereign immunity".

    Update: Although this is a trial court decision, it summarizes the law in relation to an effort to sue the NCIC for a claim of defamation over an alleged error in the NICS database:
    Quote Quoting Cleveland v. Arpaio, Dist. Court, D. Arizona 2013 (citations omitted)
    An action for damage to reputation ordinarily "lies . . . in the tort of defamation, not in [42 U.S.C. §] 1983."... "To recover damages for defamation under § 1983, a plaintiff must satisfy the `stigma-plus test.'"... "Under that test, `a plaintiff must allege loss of a recognizable property or liberty interest in conjunction with the allegation of injury to reputation.'" .... The injury must be to a "previously recognized right or status.".... Further, "the `stigma-plus test' requires that the defamation be accompanied by an injury directly caused by the Government, rather than an injury caused by the act of some third party [in reaction to the Government's defamatory statements]." Id. at 1320 (injuries caused by third party's response to government statements not cognizable under § 1983). "There are two ways to state a cognizable § 1983 claim for defamation-plus: (1) allege that the injury to reputation was inflicted in connection with a federally protected right, or (2) allege that the injury to reputation caused the denial of a federally protected right.".... Plaintiff alleges an injury to his reputation based on the actions of others in reaction to allegedly defamatory statements by governmental statements. He does not allege facts to support that any injury to reputation was inflicted in connection with a federally protected right. Nor does he allege facts to support that the injury to his reputation caused the denial of a federally protected right.
    In terms of suing the local Sheriff, the Sheriff's department fulfilled its legal duties: It received an application for a CCW permit, reviewed the application, ran a criminal records check through the NCIC, and due to the results of that records search was legally required to deny the application. Even assuming that a Sheriff's department had a duty to verify criminal records as reported by the FBI, and that would be quite the stretch, there's not even a stated prima facie case of defamation -- there's no communication of the criminal record by the Sheriff's Department to a third party. Do you believe that the Sheriff can be sued because his department followed the law and denied the CCW permit based upon the NICS report that included a disqualifying conviction? Although Washington has broadly abandoned sovereign immunity, even before you get into that analysis you still must identify an underlying tort. What's the underlying tort?

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