[NYTr] Another Court Ruling Protects Rights of Anonymous Internet Bloggers

[All the News That Doesn't Fit]

Public Citizen - Dec 12, 2007
http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/release.cfm?ID=2566

Court Ruling Protects Right of Bloggers to Remain Anonymous

Statement of Paul Alan Levy, Attorney With Public Citizen

The Texas Court of Appeals for the Sixth Appellate District at
Texarkana took an important step today toward protecting the rights of
Internet bloggers in Texas to write anonymously. In an opinion issued
by Justice Jack Carter in Essent v. Doe, the court of appeals joins a
broad consensus of state and federal courts in insisting that
plaintiffs present sufficient evidence to show they could win at trial
before gaining access to information identifying anonymous speakers.

The case arose from a blog about the Paris Regional Medical Center in
Paris, Texas, which included analysis of problems at the hospital ().
Claiming a concern for patient privacy, Essent, the operator of the
Medical Center, sued for defamation, and immediately sought discovery
to identify the employees who, Essent claimed, were revealing
confidential patient information in the course of criticizing abuses at
the hospital. The Doe, represented by James Rodgers of the Moore Law
Firm in Paris, sought to block discovery but District Judge Scott
McDowell upheld the request. However, the court of appeals has now
reversed the case and sent it back to the lower court for further
consideration.

In ruling, the appellate court recognized that although Internet
anonymity can be abused, the right to speak anonymously online is
protected by the First Amendment. That right cannot be denied if no
real evidence exists supporting the plaintiff’s claims of wrongdoing.
Otherwise, the very threat of litigation will have a serious chilling
effect on anonymous speech. The court also agreed with rulings in other
states that declare an anonymous blogger has “standing” to oppose
discovery even though the discovery demand is directed to a third-party
Internet hosting service, and that a blogger has the right to appeal if
their request for anonymity is denied.

The decision is not a perfect one. Unlike the Arizona Court of
Appeals’decision last month in Mobilisa v. Doe, and the 2001 ruling of
the New Jersey Appellate Division in Dendrite v. Doe, the Texas Court
of Appeals did not add an explicit balancing step, under which, for
example, the danger of retaliation against an employee whistleblower
can be considered in deciding whether the plaintiff has shown enough
evidence of wrongdoing. This case may well present a realistic
possibility of such retaliation. So far as we have been able to
determine, the balancing test was not argued to the Texas court. 

Still, the requirement of presenting evidence provides an important
measure of protection for employee whistleblowers and other anonymous
critics of powerful corporations, political figures and others.

READ the opinion:
http://www.6thcoa.courts.state.tx.us/opinions/HTMLOpinion.asp?OpinionID=9055

Public Citizen was not involved in the Essent case, but its attorneys
have argued many important cases involving anonymous Internet speech,
including Dendrite, Mobilisa and Doe v. Cahill. 

LEARN MORE:
http://www.citizen.org/litigation/briefs/IntFreeSpch/cases/articles.cfm?ID=14267


[Paul Alan Levy runs the Internet Free Speech program at Public
Citizen.]