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A Service of Florida Law Weekly-- Serving Florida's Lawyers for 40 Years www.FloridaLawWeekly.com (800) 351-0917 |
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A Service of Florida Law Weekly-- Serving Florida's Lawyers for 40 Years www.FloridaLawWeekly.com (800) 351-0917 |
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Civil rights -- Employment discrimination -- Religion -- State employee filed complaint asserting constitutional and statutory claims arising from his efforts to share his religious beliefs with other state employees at workplace -- Demoting employee based on finding that employee pressured subordinates to attend religious events was not improper -- A supervisor cannot properly pressure subordinates to attend religious events, and a supervisor who does so can properly be demoted, or disciplined in other ways -- Defendants are not entitled to summary judgment on merits of claim that state agency as public employer prohibited plaintiff from engaging in religious discussions or posting religious materials on bulletin board -- Qualified immunity -- Individual defendants are entitled to qualified immunity where no established precedent made clear than an employer could not prohibit a former supervisor, who had pressured subordinates to attend religious events, from continuing to engage in religious discussions or post religious materials
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Torts -- Defamation -- Complaint arising from allegedly defamatory statements in article published by defendants which focused on interview with convicted hacker and cyberterrorist who claimed to have committed cyber-attack on political campaigns at behest of plaintiff -- Pre-suit notice, which references the entire article rather than particular statements within the article, does not comply with specificity required by Section 770.01, Florida Statutes -- Dismissal with prejudice of counts against publishers is required because plaintiff did not provide sufficient notice to defendants under Section 770.01, and subsequent refiling of suit is time-barred because Florida's two-year statute of limitations has expired -- Retraction letter submitted by plaintiff did not specify the statements within subject article which plaintiff alleges to be false or defamatory as required by pre-suit statute -- Dismissal with prejudice of libel counts against individual defendants is required on basis that defendants were not served with a compliant pre-suit notice under Section 770.01, and because two-year statute of limitations has expired, any further lawsuits against individual defendants regarding the article are time barred -- Claim for negligent supervision of employees must be dismissed where underlying tort claims have been dismissed for failure to comply with pre-suit notice statute -- Neutral reporting privilege -- Florida recognizes a privilege for neutral reporting or disinterested communications of matters of public concern, even if defamatory -- Neutral reporting privilege protects the article at issue against plaintiff's libel action because it is type of disinterested and neutral reporting of newsworthy information that Florida law and First Amendment is designed to protect -- The article reported both allegations made about plaintiff by a source and plaintiff's response to those allegations -- Whether plaintiff is a public figure and whether source of article is reliable is not dispositive of the issue
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