Couteller v. Mamakos, determined yesterday by the N.Y. intermediate appellate courtroom, affirmed a default judgment in favor of a defamation plaintiff (for extra on the case, see this post concerning the preliminary trial determination):
The courtroom providently exercised its discretion by placing defendant’s reply based mostly on her “failure to adjust to courtroom orders, within the absence of ample excuses,” which allows an inference of willful and contumacious habits. The document displays that defendant didn’t attend a standing convention, didn’t meet discovery deadlines, and uncared for to speak with counsel, culminating in counsel’s software to be relieved. Defendant didn’t take any motion on this case for over a 12 months, regardless of the courtroom’s instruction to both retain new counsel or notify the courtroom of her intention to proceed professional se. Defendant failed to look at a scheduled convention however the courtroom’s warning {that a} failure to look would end in sanctions…. Defendant’s willingness to allow this case to “linger for years with out decision,” brought on prejudice to plaintiff and impaired “the environment friendly functioning of the courts.” …
The only excuse defendant supplied was that she didn’t well timed obtain the order which directed her to look as a result of it was despatched to the improper tackle. Nonetheless, the document displays that, a few month earlier than the convention, defendant’s former lawyer despatched the order through licensed mail to the identical tackle defendant offered on her movement to vacate. “A demonstrably false excuse is not going to justify the vacatur of a default.”
The courtroom correctly concluded that plaintiff established a prima facie case of defamation per se on the inquest…. Defendant’s accusations that plaintiff sexually assaulted her charged him with a severe crime, and her statements that plaintiff sexually harassed her and tried to coerce sexual favors from her in change for his help with development work are likely to injure him in his commerce, enterprise, or occupation. Plaintiff, because the resident supervisor and live-in superintendent of the constructing the place defendant owned a condominium unit, defined that accusations of sexual assault and sexual harassment might “destroy” his repute, and he would “by no means be capable of get one other job within the subject.”
Though certified privilege attaches to defendant’s statements to the police reporting against the law, and to her feedback at a gathering of the board of managers of her constructing, plaintiff sufficiently demonstrated that defendant printed the statements accusing him of sexual assault and sexual harassment with common-law malice. Plaintiff established defendant’s “one and solely trigger for the publication” of the defamatory statements was “spite or in poor health will.”
Plaintiff’s credible testimony established that defendant’s statements had been a part of a sample of retaliation meant to hurt his repute and trigger his termination. Plaintiff additionally proved defendant broadly disseminated the defamatory statements to the police, plaintiff’s employers, skilled colleagues, and each resident of the constructing, after he known as the police to implement the courtroom order barring her from altering her condo with out permission.
Terence Christian Scheurer represents plaintiff.
