Michael Leahy is one of the founders of #tcot ("Top Conservatives on Twitter") and a leader in the teaparty movement. His twitter account is http://twitter.com/...
On May 13, he was outed as having multiple tax liens by Stephanie Grasmick, http://twitter.com/... , the Founder of teablogging.net, a teabagging mockery/snark blog. See http://teablogging.net/...
Leahy was not happy about this, and yesterday he filed a civil libel lawsuit against Grasmick and Karl Frisch of mediamatters.org. The lawsuit is posted at Leahy's website http://www.tcotreport.com/... UPDATE: Leahy removed the document from his website, but a copy can be found here: http://images.dailykos.com/...
Check past the fold for details and an analysis of the lawsuit...
Leahy's basic complaint is that Grasmick called him a "tax fraud". While Leahy acknowledges having tax liens, he claims this does not mean he is a tax fraud. He is right on the count. A tax lien simply means some government agency claims he has unpaid taxes, not that he committed tax fraud, or tax evasion, or cheated on his taxes. (Its not clear at this point if he also admits to having unpaid taxes.)
Leahy is also correct that falsely accusing someone of a crime can constitute libel. See http://www.eff.org/... The saving stroke for Grasmick however may be that she said "major tax fraud, apparently", and she posted all of her source documents (a Lexis/Nexus search). The word "apparently" simply conveys her impression of the appearances of what she found. That is her opinion and it is protected speech under the First Amendment. Her story on the tax liens also stated:
In an uncharacteristic act of actual journalism, Teablogging.net contacted Mr. Leahy prior to the publication of this post. He thanked us for the heads up (and chided us for using dirty words) but didn’t offer any further comment. Boo-yah.
The fact that Leahy was given an opportunity to correct the story but did not presents a serious problem for his libel suit.
Its not clear what Leahy wants to accomplish. Maybe he just wants to suppress free speech. He certainly appears to have accomplished that, since Grasmick has gone quiet. He is soliciting apologies, so maybe he's just looking for political/social leverage. He also claims he's entitled to discovery, and wants to go fishing for communication between Grasmick and others, possibly so he can "discover" and publicize some vast left-wing conspiracy.
On the other hand, he may have opened a big can of worms that could come back to bite him in the teabags. One defense of libel is that the statements are true. In other words, if Grasmick can prove that Leahy is a tax fraud, she is not liable for libel. In an effort to prove that, she would probably be entitled in discovery to all of Leahy's tax records, including his tax returns and correspondence with the IRS. That might make for an interesting story, one that he would not want to come out.
The next step in this process is that Leahy has to make service of a summons and complaint. That means he has to arrange for a sworn process server to deliver these documents to Grasmick, possibly by hand or possibly by leaving a copy at her last known address. If he doesn't do that, the lawsuit is dismissed.
At that point, Grasmick and Frisch would probably need to hire an attorney to defend themselves. They may have a valid defense in terms of jurisdiction. Leahy filed this lawsuit pro-se in the "General Sessions Court" of Williamson County Tennessee, which is the equivalent of small claims court. This court's "jurisdiction, power and authority" are limited to Williamson County. See http://michie.lexisnexis.com/... .
Since Leahy is a public figure, he would also be obligated to prove actual malice. His proof of this is pretty slim, a statement by someone else that was sent to Grasmick, not a statement by Grasmick herself, so they may be able to get dismissal on that grounds.
The bottom line however is that if the suit goes forward, it will be a nuisance for Grasmick and Frisch, and they will need help covering legal expenses. Hopefully they can find a good pro-bono attorney in Williamson County, Tennessee. But with the right resources, this lawsuit could blow up in Leahy's face.
It will be interesting to see what comes next.