Virginia Lawyers Weekly

Two Christiansburg bloggers hit with a $10 million lawsuit by a local businessman may face another round in court after their initial victory this month.

Meanwhile, the increasing numbers of such lawsuits has led a national organization to launch a program that offers legal advice and a liability insurance program for amateur Web-writers like the Christiansburg pair.

The dispute that landed in Montgomery County Circuit Court began with a pile of dirt. Christiansburg homebuilder Roger Woody claims he was unfairly attacked by a blog called “Think, Christiansburg!” (www.think christiansburg.com). In May, he filed a $10 million lawsuit against the bloggers who criticized the appearance of his building sites, which included a large mound of topsoil.
Montgomery County Circuit Judge Ray W. Grubbs ruled Oct. 13 that Woody’s original lawsuit fell short of the particulars needed to make out a case for business conspiracy, contract interference, and “insulting words” (VLW 008-8-224). Grubbs wrote that he would allow Woody to file an amended complaint.

Woody’s lawyer, B.K. Cruey of Shawsville, said Tuesday that Woody has directed him to file the amended complaint.

Woody sued Terry Ellen Carter and Tacy L. Newell-Foutz, authors of the “Think, Christiansburg!” blog. Woody named two other defendants, but they apparently had no connection with the blog.

The blog posts that led to Woody’s lawsuit focused on the appearance of a lot owned by Woody where he stored a pile of topsoil and various construction materials. The bloggers referred to the dirt pile as “Mount Woody” and claimed that it had “besmirched the landscape FOR YEARS.”

The bloggers also posted pictures of haphazard piles of construction materials which, they said, created a “visual nuisance for neighborhood residents.”

In his original lawsuit, Woody stated that the pile of topsoil had been on the land for only a few months. He claimed it violated no regulations and said that he could not move it until he received government approval of an erosion control plan.

Woody accused the bloggers of “intentionally and maliciously publish [ing] false and misleading information” about him. He demanded $10 million, claiming that Carter’s blog hurt his reputation and caused a loss of sales and profit.

Rebecca K. Glenberg of the ACLU of Virginia teamed up with ACLU cooperating attorney Jonathan Rogers of Floyd to defend Carter.

In sustaining the bloggers’ demurrer, Grubbs declined to consider their First Amendment arguments. He ruled that the argument for constitutional protection “is more appropriately addressed as an affirmative defense to the complaint.”

Testing only the sufficiency of the pleadings, Grubbs ruled the complaint fell short on facts needed to support claims of conspiracy to harm a business, tortious inference with contract, and “insulting words.”

Rogers said that Woody was simply trying to stifle public criticism. “It was nothing but a bogus SLAPP suit,” Rogers said. “There was no meat on those bones.”

The ACLU says that, in a SLAPP suit (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation), “someone with considerable means sues someone who complains about them in public in order to silence them.”

The ACLU’s Glenberg said “The opinions expressed on Ms. Carter’s website should not have subjected her to a multi-million dollar lawsuit.”

Such suits are becoming more common, however, according to a group formed to protect the rights of bloggers and others who comment on public issues. The Citizen Media Law Project, an affiliate of Harvard law school, counts 280 legal actions against bloggers and other online publishers, with the numbers on the rise. Only four such suits were noted in 1997. The number was 89 in 2007.

Concern about lawsuits led the non-profit Media Bloggers Association last month to launch a legal protection program for bloggers, including a unique liability insurance plan. Bloggers who join the MBA are eligible to buy liability insurance through Media/Professional Insurance, a major underwriter of media liability insurance.

According to published reports, premiums for the bloggers liability policy start at about $500 and increase depending on various risk factors, including writing about local government.

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