Alabama Basketball Player’s Libel Lawsuit Against New York Times Can Go to a Jury

From Judge Annemarie Carney Axon (N.D. Ala.) in yesterday’s Spears v. N.Y. Times Co.:

Plaintiff Kai Spears was a walk-on basketball player for The University of Alabama men’s basketball team and developed close friendships with other teammates, including Brandon Miller. In the early hours of the morning on January 15, 2023, Mr. Spears and Mr. Miller visited Moe’s Original BBQ in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

Unbeknownst to Mr. Spears, another teammate—Darius Miles—asked Mr. Miller to bring Mr. Miles a gun that he had left in Mr. Miller’s car. So Mr. Miller headed to Mr. Miles, and Mr. Spears started back to his dorm. A few minutes later, gunfire erupted on the Strip, and Michael Davis, Mr. Miles’s childhood friend, shot and killed Jamea Harris using the gun that Mr. Miller had brought to Mr. Miles.

{Two months later, the Times published an article, titled “A Fourth Alabama Player Was at a Deadly Shooting, in a Car Hit by Bullets.” The opening line said that the “fatal January shooting that involved players from the University of Alabama basketball team could have been even more deadly, as surveillance video showed that two players were in a car struck by bullets in the crossfire.”

It added that Mr. Spears was in the car with Mr. Miller at the time of the shooting and that Mr. Miles had asked Mr. Miller to bring Mr. Miles’s gun to the scene. The story said that the University had tried to “distance itself from the shooting” and keep “quiet” other players’ involvement. The article then discussed widespread criticism that Mr. Miller and the University received when Mr. Miller continued to play after the shooting.}

The statements about Mr. Spears were false, and this lawsuit followed….

The court concluded that Spears has the burden of showing “that the allegedly defamatory statements were false in all material respects,” but it concluded that he had introduced enough evidence of that to go to the jury:

At the motion to dismiss stage, the Times argued the article’s statements were not defamatory because the article portrayed Mr. Spears as a potential victim. In addressing the Times’s argument about the statements that Mr. Spears was “in a car struck by bullets” and that the shooting “could have been even more deadly,” Judge Coogler noted that “[r]ead alone, these statements do not appear reasonably capable of conveying a defamatory meaning.” But Judge Coogler added that—when considering whether a news article had a defamatory meaning—Alabama law requires the article to be read as a whole. Judge Coogler explained that the entire article could allow an ordinary reader to conclude “[Mr.] Spears was somehow complicit in the shooting.” ….

Mr. Spears has produced sufficient evidence to meet his burden because a reasonable jury could conclude that Mr. Spears was not “involved” in the shooting. Although Mr. Spears was with Mr. Miller for the hours leading up to the shooting, Mr. Spears had no knowledge that Mr. Miller was communicating with Mr. Miles or that Mr. Miles had asked Mr. Miller to bring him his gun.

On top of this, Mr. Spears did not know where Mr. Miller planned to go or what he planned to do when he left Moe’s. Nor did he know that Mr. Miles’s gun was in Mr. Miller’s car. And of course, Mr. Spears did not get in Mr. Miller’s car and was not at the scene of the shooting when it occurred. At the time of the shooting, Mr. Spears and his friends were on their way back to his dorm. Mr. Spears knew about the shooting only after it happened….

For more on the December 2023 decision in the case denying the motion to dismiss, see this post.

Mary Virginia Buck, R. Matt Glover (Prince, Glover & Hayes P.C.), and Stephen P. New represent plaintiff.