In a New York Time’s interview Jeff Greene, the billionaire who unsuccessfully challenged Kendrick Meek for the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate, is preparing to sue the St. Petersburg Times and Miami Herald, claiming stories the newspapers published cost him his bid for the United States Senate.
Mr. Greene lost the Democratic primary last week to Kendrick B. Meek, who will face Gov. Charlie Crist, an independent, and Marco Rubio, a Republican, in November.
During a bruising primary, Greene faced a series of questions about parties aboard his yacht and fraudulent real estate deals. Greene has singled out two news articles that were printed in the Times and the Herald, and an editorial in the Times.
During the interview with the New York Times on Tuesday, Greene said; “I want to send a message to every newspaper in the country: Do your homework. I deserve to have the record corrected, and they deserve to be punished”.
In one article, The Times reported that Greene was party to a real estate deal that left 300 California families homeless and a partner of his in jail. The other left the impression that boxer Mike Tyson, who was the best man at Greene’s wedding, used drugs while on Greene’s 145-foot yacht the Summerwind. Even thought the paper later ran a front-page correction clarifying that Tyson said he had not used drugs on the yacht.
Greene will seek at least $500 million in damages, famed libel attorney L. Lin Wood has told the paper he plans to file file a formal complaint in state court in Miami-Dade County today, September 1, 2010..
With money not a problem to hire the very best, Greene hired L. Lin Wood, a prominent libel lawyer who has won settlements for other public figures who claimed they were defamed by the news media, including Richard A. Jewell, the security guard cleared as a suspect in the 1996 Olympics bombing in Atlanta; Howard K. Stern the lawyer and boyfriend of model Anna Nicole Smith as well as the estate of Anna Nicole Smith in recovering alleged stolen property the day after her death; John and the late Patsy Ramsey the parents of JonBenet Ramsey, former U. S. Congressman Gary Conduit in a battle with author Dominick Dunne involving Coduit’s intern Chandra Levy’s death; Beth Holloway Twitty, mother of Natalee Holloway, and the victim of an alleged rape involving Kobe Bryant the famous basket ball player..
Neil Brown, the editor of St. Petersburg Times in an email to the New York Time stated; “The Times’ coverage of Mr. Greene and his business transactions has been thorough and fair, and the reporting is well-documented in public records”, while defending the newspaper of any wrongdoing.
Sandra S. Baron, executive director of the Media Law Resource Center said; “even with an admission of error, Jeff Greene is going to have to prove that the articles were published with actual malice.”
This folks is going to be the libel suit of all times, as always L. Lin Wood’s hand picked legal team filed the Original Complaint late today in the In the Circuit Court of the 11th Judicial Circuit in and for Miami-Dade County, Florida. The suit states in part that the papers and reporters listed in the suit, …”[Defendants] abandoned journalistic integrity and ignored the fundamental canons of journalistic conduct while wholeheartedly embracing the publication of false and defamatory articles about Greene with Constitutional actual malice. As a result, Defendants crossed the threshold from speech protect by the First Amendment to enter the arena of actionable libel for which they must be held legally accountable.” The suit further states that reporters and papers, “not only published the articles with the goal of destroying the personal, business and political reputation of Green, Defendants also urged that Green be criminal investigated by the FBI in connection with serious crimes.” This billionaire, Jeff Greene, has the money to stay in this suit with only the best libel and defamation lawyer, L. Lin Wood, right up and through any trial. Like I said before the primary, the papers should have done a front page correction on all of the issues and addressing all of the points that Wood presented in his two letters to the papers before the Florida primary with. the corrections but also made it clear they might be a tad bias as both newspapers endorsed Greene’s opponent, Kendrick B. Meek in the primary last week.
The expressions in this blog article are based on the opinions of Rose Turner or our featured authors, please remember we are not lawyers and those opinions expressed here are each of our individual opinions and should not be taken as legal advice and/or legal opinions. The comments following this blog article are the opinions and sole property of the blog site members and do not necessarily reflect those of the site owners. If comments to this or any other articles are not related to the article or does not meet the terms of use for Rose Speaks, they will be removed by the moderators.
After demanding as big of a retraction and as prominently placed as the full page articles Jeff Greene alleged trashed him, in stead is a tiny correction enough to keep L. Lin Wood at bay?
As a lawsuit loomed and could have been filed as early as today, the St Petersburg Times but not the Miami Herald placed a small correction reports the South Florida Lawyers blog. The lawyers blog reported this morning, August 20, 2010 that the correction stated; “Boxer Mike Tyson’s July interview with Sports Illustrated, quoted in a front-page story on August 13, described his travels in Europe during the summer of 2005, not 2007 when he served as Jeff Greene’s best man. In addition, Tyson has since clarified that the 2005 events he described involving a drug dealer from Amsterdam did not occur aboard Greene’s yacht and that “he didn’t do drugs on the boat.”
That is not the extensive front page of corrections that Greene’s attorney L. Lin Wood had demanded and in fact when I read through all five pages of corrections I could not find it. However, after prowling through other sites I did find a tiny box with a correction at Newseum.org where I had to take the picture to blow it up to find it on the left hand side towards the bottom. That said, it is on the front page of the print section today via online in PDF form for St Petersburg Times and in print the actual paper has it on the front page which will catch some voters attention.
One article listed on Allvoices.com states it has doubts that this will be enough to change the momentum heading into the August 24 vote by stating; “All these allegations have been denied by Jeff Greene, as he says that he just did normal things on the yacht like scuba diving and kayaking etc. and says that no wild parties went on over there. Despite all these rebuttals by Jeff Greene, doubt has been cast on him and it is likely that it gets reflected in his election results.”
The correction was in today’s newspapers but the rumors had already been picked up by the Huffington Post.com on August 17, 2010 of; “Tyson, now sober, offered a detailed account of time he spent on Greene’s yacht to Sports Illustrated last month.” This [drug dealer] goes and gets me a big rock of cocaine. So pretty soon I got a party going on. I got everything: I got these rugby players. I got these naked girls, I got all these … everything’s going on in the room.”
When Policto.com asked Greene about the allegations they report that Greene held his ground, calling the accounts “silliness.” “There were a couple of disgruntled employees that came out with these crazy stories about vomit,” said the Senate hopeful. “If someone has a boat and they have a crew, why would there be vomit on it?”
Is this enough to deter Jeff Greene from filing a defamation suit against the St. Petersburg Times and the Miami Herald? The alleged defamation appeared on page one each time in both papers and the Aug. 11, 2010 letter as well as the August 16, 2010 letter outlined a large amount of the wrong perception and alleged defamation put out by both papers. It is worth noting that the one correction referring to Mike Tyson is on the front page, but way down in the left hand corner. The other corrections alleging possible connections to crimes involving the sale of property in California those demanded corrections cannot be found .
We get the Miami Herald updates several times a day via email one has to wonder if they will also put up corrections at least on their online newspaper. The Miami Herald has no retraction and instead dated yesterday, August 19 has an article that continues to hammer what is sees as Greene’s negative points and continues to say in part:’ Despite his altruistic proclamations, Greene has had a hard time shedding a party-boy image with questionable friends. Former boxer and convicted rapist Mike Tyson was his best man; actress Lindsay Lohan, who is battling problems with alcohol and drugs, was a guest on his yacht; and Heidi Fleiss, who served prison time for running a prostitution ring for the rich and famous, was his house guest for a year. He has a 145-foot yacht that Belize officials say damaged a coral reef – a claim Greene denies. Greene arrived in Cuba on the same yacht, Summerwind, on a trip that’s become a campaign issue. He says the Cuba stop was for emergency repairs and while he was there he visited people in the Jewish community. There are other reports of partying and a shopping spree. Greene says the string of stories are “irresponsible journalism” and dirt dug up from his past.”
The democratic primary vote between Jeff Greene and Rep. Kendrick Meek is next Tuesday, August 24, 2010.
One has to wonder if this is enough for Jeff Greene and his defamation legal eagle, Wood?. My bet is that if Jeff Greene loses the primary, and he is slipping in the ranks with the allegations continuing to pour out in online and print news now going nationally and internationally, then we can expect a suit filed August 25, 2010 the day after the primary. This goes to the old saying, if someone opens up Pandora ’s Box it is very hard to close it and harder still to put out the fires.
Be sure to participate in our MEMBERS ONLY FORUMS, get the most out of the site by learning your way around in the forums where you can safely discuss things you do not want to see copied and pasted on another site.
The expressions in this blog article are based on the opinions of Rose Turner or our featured authors, please remember we are not lawyers and those opinions expressed here are each of our individual opinions and should not be taken as legal advice and/or legal opinions. The comments following this blog article are the opinions and sole property of the blog site members and do not necessarily reflect those of the site owners. If comments to this or any other articles are not related to the article or does not meet the terms of use for Rose Speaks, they will be removed by the moderators.
Per CNN: Florida Senate candidate Jeff Greene is a billionaire real estate investor who has spent millions to fund his primary campaign against fellow Democrat, Rep. Kendrick Meek. Now, one week before Florida’s primary elections, Greene is preparing to spend his money on a lawsuit against two Florida newspapers if they don’t publish lengthy retractions to damning articles they recently published about him.
Famed Bryan Cave LLP defamation attorney L. Lin Wood is the attorney Greene has chosen to represent him in what is shaping up as a very expensive battle with the St. Petersburg Times and the Miami Herald. The papers have a working partnership and often share resources to cover state news.
Times editor Neil Brown said last week after receiving a letter dated August 11, that no retraction is forthcoming, and Greene is expected to follow through, potentially as early as Friday, August 20, 2010
Both papers have endorsed Greene’s opponent, Meek in the Democratic primary for Senate Florida’s primary elections will be held Tuesday, August 24.
The allegations leading up to the threat of a defamation case is based on that one of the stories, first published on August 8, the Times reported that in 2006, Greene had sold California property to Delbert McConville, who is now in jail facing conspiracy and money laundering charges. Greene admits to selling McConville 300 condos, but insists that his connection to McConville ends there and that he was not a party to the dealings McConville engaged in that led him to jail.
Then we have the article stating links between Mike Tyson and Greene even going as far as to tying in a Sport’s Illustrated Article interview of July 28 where Tyson allegedly describes Greene’s 145-foot yacht, the activity on the yacht; including it was lavish, and teeming with naked, drunken parties. Greene denies those claims. Tyson–who is a close friend to Greene and was best man at his 2007 wedding–spent a month aboard Greene’s yacht, Summerwind, during the summer of 2005, however the Sport’s Illustrated Article does not name Greene. Sport’s Illustrated would not comment to CNN.
In the August 16 letter to the Miami Herald executive editor Anders Gyllenhaal, attorney L. Lin Wood, said the stories are “replete with false, misleading and defamatory statements of fact concerning Mr. Greene.”
Greene is threatening to open his wallet wide to wage this legal fight. “It will be a substantial lawsuit, because I am a high net-worth individual who does earn a lot of money,” Greene said at a press conference last week that was recorded by the Miami Herald, “and if my reputation is damaged, the St. Petersburg Times will be held accountable.”
Neil Brown has stated; “The Times’ coverage of Mr. Greene and his business transactions has been thorough and fair, and the reporting is well-documented in public records,” Brown said in a statement published on The Times’ political blog. “Our story is accurate, balanced and we stand by it.”Mr. Greene is welcome to submit a letter to the editor if he wishes to take further exception.”
An aide to Greene told CNN that this is no political bluff and that “recklessly disregarding the truth is actionable and Jeff plans to take action.”
The South Florida Law Blog says in their article today; “to paraphrase Steely Dan, Lin Wood is a major dude. He previously represented accused Centennial Olympic Park bomber Richard Jewell, the parents of Jon Benet Ramsey, Howard K. Stern, and has been involved in many other high-profile defamation cases. The article goes on to muse that; “if the Herald will retain our own silver fox, Sandy Bohrer, …if so we are looking at a powerhouse match up.”
Rose Speaks.com will follow this suit for sure if it is filed in Federal Court which it might not be as all of the parties are located as entities or citizens of Florida. If it is file in state Court if the Sunshine state shares the filings as they have on other high profile cases then we will followed the case as well.
This is going to prove up to be an interesting fall season if Wood slaps both papers with defamation suits in the next few days.
Be sure to participate in our MEMBERS ONLY FORUMS, get the most out of the site by learning your way around in the forums where you can safely discuss things you do not want to see copied and pasted on another site.
The expressions in this blog article are based on the opinions of Rose Turner or our featured authors, please remember we are not lawyers and those opinions expressed here are each of our individual opinions and should not be taken as legal advice and/or legal opinions. The comments following this blog article are the opinions and sole property of the blog site members and do not necessarily reflect those of the site owners.
Entries (RSS)