Blanton v. City of Charleston (Lawyers Weekly No. 002-194-14, 10 pp.) (C. Weston Houck, J.) 2:13-cv-02804; D.S.C.
Holding: When defendant Williams talked to a reporter after a fire, he only made one statement about plaintiff – his rival for a promotion – that could be considered a statement of fact: that plaintiff had made mistakes. Plaintiff admitted that he made mistakes, and the rest of Williams’ statements about plaintiff were hyperbolic and not capable of being verified as true or false. Consequently, plaintiff cannot state a claim for defamation.
The court grants defendant’s motion to dismiss plaintiff’s defamation claim.
Defendant’s first statement said the plaintiff “made a tremendous amount of mistakes.” Since plaintiff admitted he made mistakes, he cannot sustain an accusation that defendant made a false statement about a true fact. “Tremendous” falls within a category of loose, figurative, or hyperbolic language that cannot reasonably be interpreted as stating an actual fact about an individual. Therefore, the first statement cannot reasonably be interpreted as stating a fact about plaintiff.
Defendant also said, “I did everything I could to get [plaintiff] retrained and save his job … but if you don’t have it after 30 years, I can’t save you.” This statement is not provable as a fact or a falsity because it employs figurative, hyperbolic language.
The article then paraphrases, “[Defendant] said he didn’t want the assignment to retrain [plaintiff] but did so at [the fire chief’s] request. Despite involving others and trying numerous approaches, he said, [plaintiff] just couldn’t get up to speed with the new way of doing things.”
Again, the paraphrased statement employs figurative language (“he just couldn’t get up to speed”) that is not capable of being verified as true or false. Therefore, the third statement cannot reasonably be interpreted as stating a fact about plaintiff.
Dismissed.