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Law Prof Sues Students for Defamation
The New York Times today picks up on a story that has been making its way around the blogosphere for several days, that of the University of Arkansas law professor, Richard J. Peltz, who is suing two of his students, alleging that they defamed him by accusing him of being racist. The accusations came after a 2005 constitutional law class in which Peltz, a nationally known authority on the First Amendment and freedom of information, was described as having criticized affirmative action and having displayed a belittling satirical article from The Onion on Rosa Parks. According to the NYT:
Amid simmering tensions, Professor Peltz last month filed a civil lawsuit against two of the law students, Valerie D. Nation and Chrishuana L. Clark, both third-year students. The lawsuit also names as defendants Eric S. Buchanan, who is a lawyer for the W. Harold Flowers Law Society in Little Rock, an association of black lawyers in Arkansas; the society itself; and the local chapter of the Black Law Students Association.
The complaint, filed in state court in Little Rock, alleges defamation of character and seeks unspecified monetary and punitive damages. The complaint says, among other things, that at the invitation of the Black Law Students Association, Professor Peltz took part in a legitimate academic debate in which he questioned the constitutionality and effectiveness of affirmative action. His lawyer, John E. Tull III, declined to comment Wednesday beyond saying that Professor Peltz was not racist.
The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette first reported the lawsuit last Sunday, saying that Peltz felt compelled to go to court after the "false allegations of racism" had snowballed to the point where he believed he had to take action to protect his reputation. "I am treated as a pariah. I am presumed guilty of the defamatory charges that have been leveled against me by students," he wrote in a Sept. 13, 2007, e-mail to another professor, which the Democrat-Gazette obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request. "Students’ defamatory allegations, which the dean permits with impunity, are taken as gospel truth, and I am spat on."
Other legal bloggers who have picked up on this story include Kashmir Hill, Stephen Bainbridge, Ann Althouse, Paul Caron, Geoffrey Rapp and Walter Olson. Hill at Above the Law pointed to another possible case of professor v. student, first reported by the Dartlog blog at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire. Priya Venkatesan, formerly a writing professor there, last week notified students by e-mail that they would be included in a lawsuit accusing the college of racial discrimination. The status of this is not clear, as the blog later reported that the former professor had changed her mind and then changed it again.
As for the aforementioned New York Times piece about Peltz's lawsuit, it concludes with what may be a classic case of understatement: "The Arkansas case could do more than give law students practical
experience before they take the bar; it could also renew debate about
free speech on campus and academic freedom." Not only could it renew such debate, it already has.
Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on May 1, 2008 at 01:05 PM | Permalink
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