THOMAS P. POMEROY, APPELLANT,
v.
SOUTHERN BELL TELEPHONE & TELEGRAPH COMPANY, A FOREIGN CORPORATION, AND JOEL D. WARE, APPELLEES
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Thomas Pomeroy, a county evaluation team head, sued Southern Bell and Vice-President Joel Ware for defamation based on a letter Ware wrote to Pomeroy's superior claiming Pomeroy had 'grossly biased' evaluations against Southern Bell. The trial court dismissed the complaint, and the appellate court affirmed, holding that Ware's statements were expressions of opinion and therefore non-actionable.
The allegedly defamatory statements were expressions of opinion and were therefore properly determined to be non-actionable as a matter of law.
[1] Statements of opinion, as opposed to factual assertions, are generally not actionable as defamation.
[2] A communication is not defamatory if it constitutes a subjective expression of belief or evaluation rather than a statement of verifiable fact.
Previewing 2 of 2 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“the allegedly defamatory statements sued upon were no more than expressions of opinion and were therefore properly determined to be non-actionable as a matter of law”
States the court's holding that opinion statements cannot form the basis of defamation liability
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligencePomeroy headed a Dade County evaluation team that made successive recommendations against Southern Bell's bids on various projects. Ware, a Southern B…
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SCHWARTZ, Judge.
Stung by successive recommendations by a Dade County evaluation team headed by Thomas Pomeroy against the company’s bids on various projects, Joel Ware, a Southern Bell vice-president, wrote to Pom-eroy’s superior — with copies to the county manager and another county official— which, in essence, complained that he had “grossly biased” the evaluations against Southern Bell.1 The trial court dismissed Pomeroy’s complaint against Ware and Southern Bell, based on the letter, with prejudice. In our view, the allegedly defamatory statements sued upon were no more than expressions of opinion and were therefore properly determined to be non-actionable as a matter of law. From v. Tallahassee Democrat, Inc., 400 So. 2d 52 (Fla.1st DCA 1981); Palm Beach Newspapers, Inc. v. Early, 334 So. 2d 50 (Fla.4th DCA 1976), appeal dismissed, cert. denied, 354 So. 2d 351 (Fla.1977), cert. denied, 439 U.S. 910, 99 S.Ct. 277, 58 L.Ed.2d 255 (1978).
Affirmed.
. In its entirety, the letter stated:
Dear Roger:
I have previously expressed to you that the evaluations by the County Communications Evaluation Committee are being grossly biased against Southern Bell by Tom Pomeroy. I have personally reviewed the details of some of these evaluations and formed this opinion.
I was shocked today to find an additional impact his evaluations are having on Southern Bell. The attached County evaluation sheet was attached to a proposal on a competitive case with one of our business customers.
Roger, I don’t believe that you condone this practice of allowing Southern Bell management to be put in embarrassing situations as a result of apparent unobjectivity on the part of staff.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Authorities Cited
- Shaw From v. Tallahassee Democrat, Inc., 400 So. 2d 52 (Fla. 1st DCA 1981)
- Early v. Palm Beach Newspapers, Inc., 439 U.S. 910 (U.S. 1978)
- Cullum Elec. & Mech., Inc. v. Mech. Contractors Ass'n of S.C., 439 U.S. 910 (U.S. 1978)
- Palm Beach Newspapers, Inc. v. Early, 334 So. 2d 50 (Fla. 4th DCA 1976)
- Early v. Palm Beach Newspapers, Inc., 354 So. 2d 351 (Fla. 1977)