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How difficult and expensive is it to sue for libel. I have been insulted by an allegation in divorce court (not in a case about me) by a relative claiming I damaged property by placing computer virus' on a computer to which I have no access. The claim is made is direct motions to the court and are untrue. I am a PhD student in engineering and this will cause serious damage to my reputation and earning potential if it is not refuted and sealed.
State/Country of Question: Kansas Already Tried: I have sent reply emails to the person making the claim, and his attorney stating that if I ever hear of another such claim, that legal action will follow. They have now done it yet again and I want something to be done.
There are essential key elements you would need to meet before you can sue for defamation of character. These are:Quoting:
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OK. I have a statement made under oath and submitted to the court from the petitioner is a divorce case, it states directly that the respondent of the case and I conspired to infect business computers and to therefor damage the property/viabillity of the business.1. This was made under oath and I have a written copy as submitted by the attorney. There is NO evidence as I did nothing of the sort.I am finishing a PhD in engineering and have recently been granted a large sum of money to do further work as a Post Doctoral Fellow. The very nature of the grant process involves digging into litigation to see if the person to receive money (my current grant is in excess of 3 million dollars and I am applying for over 10 million more) is trustworthy. This type of statement made in open court can do nothing but harm my abillity to further my professional career. 2. The statement was made in a submission to a court judge and is therfor public domain. Does this meet your criterion of unprivaledged publication?3. Im not sure i understand your third point... They have no evidence, and I can assure you that neither has the technical know how to even know IF it would be possible to prove (it is possible to DISPROVE easily).4. See the statement above as it pertains directly to my abillity to further my career as a scientist working with public/private grant funds to continue my research.Thank you XXX X look forward to your reply.
Thank you XXX XXXX reply and additional informationUnprivilege publication means the intentional or negligent publication of false a false statement of fact intended to result in harm. The person who made the statement would be liable for the unprivileged publication, but someone like the court who makes it into public domain would have a conditional privilege (since they are merely placing on record what someone else has said). Hope this makes sense. So the person who made the statement would not have a privilege to make the statement since the initiated the false communication.The third point was an attempt to clarify the defenses to a defamation cause of action which are: 1) truth, 2) statement of opinion or 3) statement of a belief.One thing I need to point out is that in Kansas you can sue under a defamation per se which means that the statement was defamatory on its face even if you did not sustain any present damages. If the communication imputes allegations which will injury in your trade, business, or profession, you can sue without having to prove the last element of damages. So with the new info presented it would appear you have a case for defamation per se since the reference directly affects your profession and the person who made the statement has no privilege since they have intentionally or with negligence made a false statement.Hope this helps.
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