Starr v. United Artists Corp.

Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of New York

Starr v. United Artists Corp.

10 A.D.2d 836, 200 N.Y.S.2d 356, 1960 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 10530

CourtAppellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York

DecidedApril 21, 1960

StatusPublished

This text of 10 A.D.2d 836 (Starr v. United Artists Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook

Starr v. United Artists Corp., 10 A.D.2d 836, 200 N.Y.S.2d 356, 1960 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 10530 (N.Y. Ct. App. 1960).

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Opinion

Order denying motion to dismiss complaint in libel for insufficiency unanimously affirmed, with $20 costs and disbursements to plaintiff-respondent. The complaint by alleging that defendant Columbia Pictures Corporation knowingly composed and published the alleged defamatory letter necessarily imports, either that defendant Ferguson acted as employee of such corporation and within the scope of his employment, or that his act was at the direction of his corporate employer. As a consequence, plaintiff will have to prove as much in order to sustain the complaint. And this, on argument of the appeal, was not disputed by plaintiff. To the extent that the ratio decidendi in Flanagan v. McDermott Dairy Co. (132 App. Div. 166) would suggest otherwise, it is not followed. Rotably, in that case it was observed that: “The form of the letter on its face is a letter of Johnson’s to a third party, having no relation to the corporation or its business or affairs” (p. 168). The same could not be said in this case. Concur — Breitel, J. P., M. M. Frank, Valente, Stevens and Bergan, JJ. [20 Misc 2d 636.]

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Order denying motion to dismiss complaint in libel for insufficiency unanimously affirmed, with $20 costs and disbursements to plaintiff-respondent. The complaint by alleging that defendant Columbia Pictures Corporation knowingly composed and published the alleged defamatory letter necessarily imports, either that defendant Ferguson acted as employee of such corporation and within the scope of his employment, or that his act was at the direction of his corporate employer. As a consequence, plaintiff will have to prove as much in order to sustain the complaint. And this, on argument of the appeal, was not disputed by plaintiff. To the extent that the ratio decidendi in Flanagan v. McDermott Dairy Co. (132 App. Div. 166) would suggest otherwise, it is not followed. Rotably, in that case it was observed that: “The form of the letter on its face is a letter of Johnson’s to a third party, having no relation to the corporation or its business or affairs” (p. 168). The same could not be said in this case. Concur — Breitel, J. P., M. M. Frank, Valente, Stevens and Bergan, JJ. [20 Misc 2d 636.]

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Bluebook (online)

10 A.D.2d 836, 200 N.Y.S.2d 356, 1960 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 10530, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/starr-v-united-artists-corp-nyappdiv-1960.

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