Pan Am sues "Atlantic Northeast Rails & Ports" for libel

[MEC407]

Case dismissed: http://www.leagle.com/xmlResult.aspx?xm ... -2007-CURR

The Union Leader posted this link on their web site. No article, no commentary, just the link. Kind of odd.

[jaymac]

To borrow from Miracle Max in The Princess Bride, mostly dismissed: Plaintiffs can still refile an amended complaint with 30 days, so we'll all get to see just how much PAR wants to go after ANRP.

[MEC407]

Thanks for the clarification, jaymac.

[KEN PATRICK]

i see that pan am's suit against chop hardenburg has been dismissed. i guess on the facts that no damages could be established. my involvement with guilford over the years was a failure since their pricing for waste made no sense. my trips to billerica reminded me of graveyards. old, crumbling buildings were depressing as was the plethora of rusting power. nothing that would inspire non railroad people to invest millions in new rail equipment. i watched new england transload fail even before trying to get something reasable from pan am. devens recycling original pricing and service was a joke. ken patrick

[MEC407]

I guess they must have refiled that amended complaint, but apparently it too was dismissed.

From the Portland Press Herald:

A federal judge has rejected a defamation lawsuit brought by Pan Am Railways and its former president against a small industry newsletter in a case that First Amendment advocates say demonstrates an important safeguard for the online publishing industry.
. . .
On Tuesday, federal Judge Nancy Torresen sided with the newsletter, granting its request for summary judgment, meaning that the lawsuit did not even get to trial.
. . .
Pan Am officials did not return a call for comment Wednesday. Pan Am’s attorney, Thad Zmistowski of Eaton Peabody in Bangor, said he would release a statement but none was received Wednesday.

[MEC407]

From Courthouse News Service:

A trade publication for the rail industry must face a claim that its reporting about lost train cars defamed a railway, the First Circuit ruled.
. . .
A federal judge in Maine dismissed the first version of the lawsuit for failure to state a claim, and threw out the second at summary judgment.

Describing the ensuing appeal for a three-judge panel of the First Circuit, Judge O. Rogeriee Thompson noted that the railway has made "the big-picture argument that the troublesome passages in the offending articles ... are capable of defamatory readings and are provably false."

"Wrong, and wrong again, defendants fire back," the 33-page decision states. "But, for reasons to appear shortly, we think plaintiffs are right about the lost-car comments. And so we reverse only on that issue."

Thompson rejected the newsletter's contention that its reporting about lost cars containing toxic cargo was "too cryptic" to have conveyed a defamatory thought.

Read the rest of the article at: http://www.courthousenews.com/2015/10/1 ... ircuit.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

PDF of the 33-page court decision (long but quite fascinating; definitely worth reading): http://www.courthousenews.com/2015/10/14/panam.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Rockingham Racer]

"Pan Am claims AN&P has defamed it" was a line in the story. I don't know about anyone else, but I would say Pan Am does a superb job of defaming itself

Truer words were never spoken.