Washington Post asks federal judge to throw out lawsuit from Covington Catholic student

Описание: COVINGTON, Ky. (WKRC) - A judge is now weighing whether to allow the lawsuit to move forward by a Covington Catholic student who is suing the Washington Post. The Post is asking a federal judge to throw out the case.

A team of attorneys for the Post faced off with a team of attorneys for Nicholas Sandmann. The Covington Catholic student is just 16 years old, but there are hundreds of millions of dollars at stake here. Not only is the $250-million lawsuit against the Post at stake, but other suits against CNN and NBC for $275 million each as well.

“$250 million is walking around money to Jeff Bezos,” says Lin Wood, attorney for the Sandmanns. “It's walking around money to all these other media conglomerates that make billions of upon billions of dollars. How much is it going to take to teach them a lesson?"

The question: Will the Sandmanns have the chance? They say the Post negligently and with malice re-published a viral video that tens of millions of people saw -- Sandmann face to face with a Native American elder, Nathan Phillips, who claimed Sandmann blocked his way. The Sandmanns also claim the Post reported without taking the time to exercise ordinary care.

The Catholic diocese's statement appeared to admonish Sandmann and his classmates for their conduct. Then another video surfaced and further investigation shows that Sandmann and his classmates did not confront Phillips, but he approached them.

The Post says its reporting showed no intention of defaming Sandmann and it cannot control how some biased readers may interpret their reporting. The Post says its reporting may have been embarrassing for Sandmann, but it does not rise to the threshold of defamation. Sandmann's attorney says the ordeal did a lot more than embarrass his client.

"Nicholas has sought treatment because of the emotional stress he's been under. And we don't know how a soon-to-be 17-year-old Nicholas internalizes this and how it will impact him later in life except we know that it will never go away. The internet is forever," Wood said.

The attorneys for the Post chose not to do an interview, stating that they will let their testimony in court stand.

There is more at stake here than just a billion or so dollars in damages through all these lawsuits. Should the court allow this case to continue, and should the Sandmanns prevail, media outlets may be a lot more discerning about how and whether they use third-party information in their reporting. The judge says he will take three to four weeks to make his decision whether to allow this case to move forward.