(PatrioticPost.com)- After a Clinton-appointed New York Judge tossed Sarah Palin’s defamation case against the New York Times, legal experts have come out in opposition to the decision and argued that the former Governor of Alaska should file an appeal.
Speaking to Law & Crime this week, attorney Mitchell Epner argued that the judge should have waited until the jury returned a verdict before announcing that the case would be tossed. United States District Court Judge Jed Rakoff had chosen to throw the case out, claiming that Palin could not prove that the New York Times acted with “actual malice,” before the jury had even made a decision.
“Nothing would have changed if he had waited for the verdict to have been announced, or for the jury to say that they couldn’t reach a verdict,” Epner said.
Jurors were also not supposed to know that the judge had decided to throw out the case as they deliberated, but several reports suggest that they actually know all about it.
The ruling was made by Judge Rakoff on Monday afternoon as the jury was making its decision. The case centered on a piece published by the New York Times in 2017 which attempted to connect Sarah Palin’s language and comments to the 2011 shooting in Arizona that killed six people and left Rep. Gabby Giffords seriously injured.
Even lawyers who support the judge’s decision have said that he caused confusion.
George Freeman of the Media Law Resource Center told the New York Times that while the judge did follow the law, he had also “potentially sown confusion.”
Utah university professor RonNell Andersen Jones also said that the jury verdict was also never going to be the ultimate word on the case.
Whether or not the decision was right, though, there could well be an appeal filed by Sarah Palin’s legal team very soon.
