On Monday evening, a federal judge in Kentucky reopened the $250 million defamation case filed by Covington Catholic student Nicholas Sandmann. The judge had previously dismissed the case in July, but is now allowing the lawsuit to proceed with a narrower focus.
U.S. District Judge William Bertelsman agreed to permit discovery on three of 33 allegedly libelous statements in The Post’s coverage of the Jan. 18 incident pertaining to teenager Nicholas Sandmann. The Post has insisted that its reporting was fair and accurate.
All three flagged statements from the newspaper’s coverage refer to Omaha Nation elder Nathan Phillips being blocked or impeded by Nicholas, a student at Covington Catholic High School, during their viral encounter at the Lincoln Memorial stairs.
“The Court will adhere to its previous rulings as they pertain to these statements except Statements 10, 11, and 33, to the extent that these three statements state that plaintiff ‘blocked’ Nathan Phillips and ‘would not allow him to retreat,’” Judge Bertelsman said in his Monday order.
“Suffice to say that the Court has given this matter careful review and concludes that ‘justice requires’ that discovery be had regarding these statements and their context. The Court will then consider them anew on summary judgment,” he said.
The Sandmann family’s attorneys, Todd V. McMurtry and L. Lin Wood, celebrated the judge’s order:
This is a huge win. Now #NickSandmann will be able to start discovery and find out exactly what the reporters were thinking when they attacked Nicholas and the #CovingtonCatholic kids.
— Todd V. McMurtry (@ToddMcMurtry) October 28, 2019
As a prepare for summary judgment hearing today in LA in Vernon Unsworth v. Elon Musk, the news of our team’s huge win in Covington, KY reaffirms my career-long belief that our system of justice works. Nicholas Sandmann deserves his day in court against WaPo. Now he will get it.
— Lin Wood (@LLinWood) October 28, 2019
Separate lawsuits against CNN and NBCUniversal have also been filed.
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