Defamation

A federal judge in Baltimore refused yesterday to dismiss a $5 million defamation lawsuit against Watergate figure G. Gordon Liddy, but the judge made clear he thought Liddy's accuser had presented a thin case. Chief U.S. District Judge Frederic N. Smalkin said attorneys for Ida "Maxie" Wells had presented scant evidence that Liddy wrongly relied on the word of a disbarred Washington lawyer as he investigated - and eventually embraced - an alternate theory of Watergate that links the infamous burglary to a call-girl ring.

For four years, Thomas Beall would appear each morning to picket in front of Charles Gast's office in White Marsh. Gast, a building contractor, would see Beall holding a sign that accused Gast of breaching the contract the two men signed in 1993 when Gast built Beall's $126,000 brick rancher in Joppatowne. Gast thought Beall's claims were groundless. "We made every effort to satisfy this fellow," he said. But thousands of cars drove by Gast Construction, in the 11100 block of Pulaski Highway, and that meant thousands of people saw the sign with its accusation.

WASHINGTON -- In some parts of the United States, you can be sued for disparaging pears, castigating cauliflower, ridiculing emu meat or -- as TV celebrity Oprah Winfrey learned -- bad-mouthing beef.Thirteen states, responding to pressure from agricultural organizations, have adopted food defamation laws in the 1990s. More than a dozen states are considering similar legislation.So far, the laws have been little used. But that could soon change. Their first court test is set for Jan. 7, the starting date for a federal jury trial of a lawsuit filed by Texas cattle ranchers against Winfrey and one of her guests.

A U.S. District Court judge in Baltimore yesterday dismissed a defamation suit filed by a retired Secret Service agent against the publishers of a book accusing him of accidentally shooting and killing President John F. Kennedy in 1963.Judge Alexander Harvey II yesterday dismissed the suit filed by George W. Hickey Jr. of Abingdon against St. Martin's Press, Simon & Shuster and the book's author, ruling that he waited too long to sue for defamation on the basis of the book "Mortal Error."The book by Bonar Menninger of Kansas City, Mo., claimed that Hickey, who as a 40-year-old Secret Service agent was assigned to Kennedy's Dallas motorcade, accidentally shot and killed the president.

The trial of a defamation suit filed by former political candidate John R. Greiber against the Annapolis Capital newspaper opened yesterday in Anne Arundel Circuit Court with claims that its editorial remarks humiliated him and damaged his law practice. "He has lost something he can never get back," said Roy L. Mason, the lawyer representing Greiber, a Republican who lost in the 1994 election for county state's attorney. "That is his reputation as a lawyer." Greiber filed the lawsuit shortly after John G. Gary lost his bid for re-election as county executive in 1998.

ANKARA, Turkey - This nation's best-known political cartoonists gathered in Istanbul yesterday to protest legal action taken by the prime minister against artists who criticized him through their work. Members of the Turkish Cartoonists Association accuse Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of trying to stifle free expression even as Turkey prepares to seek membership in the European Union. "We cartoonists have long faced pressure from politicians," Metin Peker, the association's president, said at a news conference.

FORMER NEW YORK Gov. Mario Cuomo, sadly, was probably correct in his observation that a jury's verdict that found three African-American activists guilty of defaming a former county prosecutor they accused of rape will change few minds.But some minds need to change if this country's dialogue on racial justice isn't to remain mired in hurling accusations, without regard to the truth.A Poughkeepsie, N.Y., jury is now trying to determine how much in damages the Rev. Al Sharpton, Alton Maddox and C. Vernon Mason owe Stephen Pagones, the former prosecutor who brought the lawsuit seeking $395 million.

G. Gordon Liddy, Watergate's macho cowboy who refused to testify during the scandal nearly 30 years ago to protect his superiors, took the stand yesterday in a style befitting his new public role - tell-all talk-radio host. Defending himself in a $5.1 million defamation case, the 70-year-old Watergate conspirator went on the charm offensive. He regaled jurors and a courtroom full of curious onlookers with his firsthand account of history and a steady stream of one-liners. Liddy at times became so animated as he testified about the events from 28 years ago that both his attorney and U.S. District Judge J. Frederick Motz sometimes cut him off because he had strayed off course.

Loyola College said yesterday it has reached a settlement of part of a civil suit filed by former Greyhounds lacrosse coach Bill Dirrigl, a suit in which Dirrigl accused the college of breach of contract and defamation after he was fired in December 2005. In a lawsuit filed in April 2006, Dirrigl said he was seeking $3.5 million in damages, claiming that the school's president, the Rev. Brian Linnane, assistant lacrosse coach Charley Toomey and several Loyola players spread "rampant and harmful rumors" that Dirrigl was using illegal drugs, including at practice on multiple occasions.

Dole has from now till San Diego to take charge of the party and get the campaign right, just as Bush did four years ago.Let's not get up the Taiwan Strait without a paddle.An Anne Arundel jury determined that the First Amendment granted equal-opportunity defamation to all candidates.The U.S. is giving Israel high tech gadgetry to prevent border infiltration. If it works, Texas will get the same.Pub Date: 3/20/96