NEW YORK — A federal appeals court on Wednesday revived Sarah Palin’s defamation lawsuit against The New York Times, citing errors by a lower judge, specifically its decision to dismiss the lawsuit while the jury was still deliberating.
The 2nd U.S. Court of Appeals in Manhattan wrote that Judge Jed S. Rakoff’s February 2022 decision to dismiss the lawsuit midway through deliberations has improperly interfered with the work of the jury.
It also found that improper exclusion of evidence, an improper instruction to the jury and an improper answer to a jury question tainted the jury’s decision to find against Palin. However, it denied Palin’s request to expel Rakoff from the case, saying he was biased against her. The 2nd Circuit said she had failed to present evidence.
The defamation lawsuit by Palin, a former Republican vice presidential candidate and former governor of Alaska, centered on a 2017 op-ed that falsely linked her campaign rhetoric to a mass shooting that Palin said damaged her reputation and career.
The Times acknowledged that her editorial was incorrect but said it quickly corrected errors that it called an “honest mistake” and that were never intended to harm Palin.
Palin’s attorney Shane Vogt said in an email that Palin was “very pleased with today’s decision, which is an important step forward in the process of holding publishers accountable for content that misleads readers and the public at large.”
“The truth deserves a level playing field, and Governor Palin looks forward to presenting her case to a jury ‘provided with relevant evidence and properly instructed in the law,’” Vogt added, quoting in part from the 2nd Circuit ruling.
Charlie Stadtlander, a spokesman for the Times, said the decision was disappointing. “We are confident that we will prevail in a new trial,” he said in an email.
The 2nd Circuit, in a ruling written by Judge John M. Walker Jr., overturned the jury’s verdict and Rakoff’s decision to dismiss the case while jurors were still deliberating.
Despite his statement, Rakoff let the jurors finish speaking and pass their judgmentwhich was against Palin.
The appeals court noted that in his ruling, Rakoff determined the credibility of the case, weighed the evidence and ignored facts or inferences that a reasonable juror might have found to support Palin’s case.
It also described how “push notifications” reaching jurors’ cellphones “were an unfortunate surprise to the district judge.” The 2nd Circuit said it was not enough that the judge’s clerk was assured by jurors that Rakoff’s ruling had not affected their deliberations.
“Given the particularly influential position a judge holds with a jury, we believe that a jury’s verdict, reached with knowledge of the judge’s already announced decision on the case, will rarely remain untainted, regardless of what the jurors say upon subsequent inquiry,” the appeals court said.
In its ruling Wednesday, the 2nd Circuit said it would grant a new trial because of several errors in the trial and because Rakoff’s ruling midway through deliberations against Palin, who may have reached jurors via cellphone notifications, “calls into question the reliability of that verdict.”
“The jury is sacrosanct in our legal system and we have a duty to protect its constitutional role, both by ensuring that the role of the jury is not usurped by judges and by ensuring that juries are provided with relevant evidence presented to them and are properly instructed in the law,” the appeals court said.
