Massachusetts Personal Injury and Workers' Compensation Law Blog
The First Circuit Court of Appeals in the case of Stanton v. Metro Corp. recently held that a disclaimer at the beginning of an article about teenage sexual mores does not insulate the Defendant-publisher from potential defamation liability.
In that case, the Defendant Metro Corp. published a story in the Boston magazine entitled "The Mating Habits of the Suburban High School Teenager." A picture of the Plaintiff, taken of her from a high school dance she attended, and in which there were four other people in the picture, was placed just above the text of the article.
There was a disclaimer that was placed below the picture of the plaintiff and the four others in the picture, and rested between the title of the article and the text of the article that stated "The photos on these pages are from an award-winning five year project on teen sexuality taken by photo-journalist Dan Habib. The individuals pictured are unrelated to the people or events described in this story. The names of the teenagers interviewed for this story have been changed." The Plaintiff contended she was defamed because she was never involved in any such "project on teen sexuality." However, on appeal, her arguments focussed exclusively on the fact that she was defamed because of the presence of her picture just above the text of the article, and how readers would incorrectly conclude that she was in any way related to the article, notwithstanding the presence of the disclaimer.