SLAPP Suits: Filed To Shut You Up

Corporations are now filing what are called "SLAPP" suits or "strategic lawsuits against public participation."

Corporations file these suits, not to win them, but because they cost critics so much money that the critics are silenced, along with everyone else who thinks about raising a question or complaint about a corporate product or practice.

Some examples of SLAPP suits from PR Watch:

In Las Vegas, a local doctor was sued for his allegation that a city hospital violated the state's cost-containment law.

In Baltimore, members of a community group faced a $252 million lawsuit after circulating a letter questioning the property-buying practices of a local housing developer.

In West Virginia, an environmental activist was sued for $200,000, for criticizing a coal-mining company for activities that were poisoning a local river.

In Pennsylvania, a farmer was sued after testifying to his township supervisors that a low-flying helicopter owned by a local landfill operator caused a stampede that killed several of his cows.

In Washington state, a homeowner found that she couldn't get a mortgage because her real-estate company had failed to pay taxes owed on her house. She uncovered hundreds of similar cases, and the company was forced to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in back taxes. In retaliation, it sued the woman for slander and dragged her through six years of legal harassment before a jury found her innocent.

In Missouri, a high-school English teacher was sued for $1 million after complaining to a weekly newspaper that an incinerator burning hospital waste was a health hazard.

For the story on this, see: Freedom of Speech, Going, Going...

In an unprecedented move that is being appealed, one of these suits has been struck down by U.S. District Judge Manuel Real (don't you love his name) and the gigantic, multi-state law firm that filed it, fined.

But the $267,000 in sanctions for filing a "frivolous lawsuit" against a community activist and three Forest Service employees will hardly stop these suits.

Corporations and their attorneys will just build it into the "cost of doing business."

It's time to write to our representatives and demand that SLAPP suits be made illegal.

In addition, interested parties are urged to call the law firm Foley and Lardner at (619) 234-6655 (San Diego) and let them know what you think of their plan to appeal and, thereby, waste more public tax dollars.

Remember, democracy requires vigilance. We need to act now or, the way things are going with the neo-cons intending to oust all judges not in their corporate pocket, we will have no avenues of action open to us in another decade.