Lawyer Advice needed regarding a defamation case.

[mykalberta]

I have a friend of a parent who is involved in Girls minor ball (age 15-16) (sister).

The top girls ball team in Edmonton purposefully sandbags games to justify going into "B" provincials in order to win.

Just an FYI - Provincials in girls sports, at least ball, soccer, etc doesnt have a separate AA for Edmonton/Calgary then A for Red Deer, Lethbridge, then B for Airdie, Leduc etc. A team from Edmonton/Calgary could play C provinicals if they wanted to win so badly and there is really nothing stopping them (also, for those of you who are in community leagues, a communitly league in Calgary has somewhere around 50K people to choose so dont gimme the classic excuses). The same is true in reverse, a team from podunk 500 population Alberta can try to get into A provincials if they so choose.

This "friend" of a parent from what I can tell wrote an email to their representative for Alberta Minor ball (who has been ignorant to this fact for years) regarding the issue. No "name-calling" was used but the team and coach were mentioned along with the "sandbagging" techniques that were used and it was termed sandbagging.

The letter somehow made its way through Email to the person mentioned and the parent's friend has subsequently been sued for defemation. In consultation with a local lawyer (I strongly suggested getting a second opinion from a firm in Edmonton) stated that to fight it would be a lost cause do to the lax defamation rules.

Here is how the lawyer stated it:

Person X, Person Y, Person Z (all 3 are die hard flames fans)

Person X calls person Y a greasers fan (definately defamation in this board). Person Y doesnt have a case for defamation unless it can be proved Person X said it.

Same as above except perzon Z overheard, now its up to person X to prove that Person Y is a greasers fan. Not sure how that happens.

Are the defamation laws so without regard for sanity that emails sent in private to one person, if that person forwards them can the original sender be sued for defamation?

I was under the assumtion that email was considered similar to a private conversation except there is a record. I find it personally hard to believe that if I have a conversation with friend over email, and indicate that say a 3rd party friend has lately been a complete ###### that person could then sue me for defamation?

I always thought defamation had to be proved to have a financial or mental burden of some sort - unless that is just US TV crime drama seeping into my brain.

If its true, that defemation is so without sanity, I need to quit posting on message boards else all the leftists members of this board will sue me

Thanks very much.

MYK

[photon]

From the research I've done into defamation..

The absolute defence of defamation is truth. If the statement is true, then there's no case.

Otherwise it becomes a measure of if the statement was opinion or not, and if it wasn't opinion and was harmful to their reputation or whatever they call it then it's defamatory.

In Canada damages don't have to be proven, damages are assumed.

The email thing though is interesting, but I think even a private email if harmful to someone's reputation and untrue could be defamatory (ie the coach lost his job and was blackballed or something).

http://www.duhaime.org/LegalResource...ation-Law.aspx

Another one, a bit better IMO

http://www.adidem.org/articles/DS5.html

Anyway, here's some useful links I found while researching this:

[urban1]

Heres my non-legal view:

What kind of lawyer would tell you to not fight a lawsuit? This is terrible legal advise.
And what kind of lawyer would turn away any sort of client?

What is the coach claiming was defamatory about the email?

For the lawsuit to succedd, the coach would have to prove that what was written in the email was untrue.

Is it really clear to everyone what this coach is doing? Why hasnt anyone else complained? How is the coach sandbagging games? Does he tell his players to not hit or to drop balls in close games?

Can you prove the sandbagging thru a historical record of boxscores? Can you get former players to admit this coach told them to sandbag it? Can you get other parents or anyone from other teams to agree on the record with your view of what the coach is doing?

At 15-16 age range, why would anyone want to play on a team like this? Scholarships to college could be at stake. And why would anyone want to play in a lesser league?

Lawsuits in kids sports are disaster for everyone. My g/f was involved in a team that was sued by a parent and it was hell for everyone involved wit the team. The lawsuit was a joke and eventually tossed out of court but it took years and ruined years of these kids childhoods involvement in this sport and was a nuissance for the coaches and all the other volunteers involved.

Bottom line go find a lawyer who deals in defamation and I think this wont go very far unless the coach has really deep pockets and just wants to hurt the author of the email by dragging this out in court and racking up the legal fees.

[Flames in 07]

Originally Posted by urban1

Heres my non-legal view:

What kind of lawyer would tell you to not fight a lawsuit? This is terrible legal advise.
And what kind of lawyer would turn away any sort of client?

What is the coach claiming was defamatory about the email?

For the lawsuit to succedd, the coach would have to prove that what was written in the email was untrue.

Is it really clear to everyone what this coach is doing? Why hasnt anyone else complained? How is the coach sandbagging games? Does he tell his players to not hit or to drop balls in close games?

Can you prove the sandbagging thru a historical record of boxscores? Can you get former players to admit this coach told them to sandbag it? Can you get other parents or anyone from other teams to agree on the record with your view of what the coach is doing?

At 15-16 age range, why would anyone want to play on a team like this? Scholarships to college could be at stake. And why would anyone want to play in a lesser league?

Lawsuits in kids sports are disaster for everyone. My g/f was involved in a team that was sued by a parent and it was hell for everyone involved wit the team. The lawsuit was a joke and eventually tossed out of court but it took years and ruined years of these kids childhoods involvement in this sport and was a nuissance for the coaches and all the other volunteers involved.

Bottom line go find a lawyer who deals in defamation and I think this wont go very far unless the coach has really deep pockets and just wants to hurt the author of the email by dragging this out in court and racking up the legal fees.

An ethical one. If a lawyer truely doesn't feel like his side has a legit chance they should not take the case.

As for this particular case I would be curous what the 'assumed' damages could possibly be. The coach can't coach softball anymore? If so I'm not sure Cdn law allows for significan financial compensation here.

Your friend may want to look for folks to could act as witnesses that could verify that ALL of what the email says is true.

[GreenTeaFrapp]

If it was forwarded along x number of times, wouldn't the sandbagger have to prove that the email hadn't been altered?

And could they prove that your friend had been the one to send it?

Force the sandbagger to prove that the email account hadn't been hacked and that the email hadn't been altered.

But I'm not a lawyer. But a quick search brought up the concept of Qualified Privilege.

[photon]

Originally Posted by Flames in 07

An ethical one. If a lawyer truely doesn't feel like his side has a legit chance they should not take the case.

As for this particular case I would be curous what the 'assumed' damages could possibly be. The coach can't coach softball anymore? If so I'm not sure Cdn law allows for significan financial compensation here.

Agree, a good lawyer should give advice on how likely the case is to succeed.

Yeah assumed damages just means they don't need to put a dollar figure on it, it's assumed that the damage has taken place. As you say I think this is partially because you don't get the huge $$'s you see elsewhere. If the lawsuit was won then the remedy would maybe just be a public apology, who knows.

Originally Posted by GreenTeaFrapp

If it was forwarded along x number of times, wouldn't the sandbagger have to prove that the email hadn't been altered?

And could they prove that your friend had been the one to send it?

Force the sandbagger to prove that the email account hadn't been hacked and that the email hadn't been altered.

But I'm not a lawyer. But a quick search brought up the concept of Qualified Privilege.

Yeah I think the prosecution would have to first prove that what was said was said. Email's probably pretty easy, they'd get the emails from all computers and servers involved.

Hm, interesting I've never read the qualified privilege before, though that seems more of a social good type situation. Not sure how that would apply in this case.

It would boil down to is the accusation of "sandbagging" true. Proving that it is would be tough, how exactly would you prove it? Maybe getting tapes from parents of games, testimony? That all sounds pretty involved, and expensive lawyer wise.

[icarus]

Sounds like a pretty silly lawsuit to me, and one that should fail. Firstly, it could fail if the allegations are proven to be true. And if the e-mail was written in confidence to a rep who is supposed to take care of such matters, then there possibly is qualified privilege. I mean, if there is no ombudsman how are such complaints to be conveyed? There was no malice involved, it was an honest concern, and it is girls softball for crying out loud... what kind of judge would rule this to be defamation?

Even whether it could be defamation at all is debatable. It was a private e-mail. It could only lower the estimation of the alleged victim in the eyes of the e-mail recipient alone, and that person seems to be someone whose job it is to deal with issues. But qualified privilege can be a bit dodgy with the wrong judge. I know in Australia a food critic was successfully sued for slamming a particular restaurant... I mean if you can't do that, then newspapers as we know them would shrivel and cease to exist.

But I too am not a lawyer. Please do not take this as legal advice.

[corporatejay]

I'm not really following you, you've got too many "friend this of a friend"

just lay it out like "x said this about y" or whatever.

btw, if x says something mean to y but no one else hears it, it's not defamation.

and calling someone an oiler fan on this board isn't defamation.

[mykalberta]

Originally Posted by urban1

Heres my non-legal view:

What kind of lawyer would tell you to not fight a lawsuit? This is terrible legal advise.
And what kind of lawyer would turn away any sort of client?

What is the coach claiming was defamatory about the email?

For the lawsuit to succedd, the coach would have to prove that what was written in the email was untrue.

Is it really clear to everyone what this coach is doing? Why hasnt anyone else complained? How is the coach sandbagging games? Does he tell his players to not hit or to drop balls in close games?

Can you prove the sandbagging thru a historical record of boxscores? Can you get former players to admit this coach told them to sandbag it? Can you get other parents or anyone from other teams to agree on the record with your view of what the coach is doing?

At 15-16 age range, why would anyone want to play on a team like this? Scholarships to college could be at stake. And why would anyone want to play in a lesser league?

Lawsuits in kids sports are disaster for everyone. My g/f was involved in a team that was sued by a parent and it was hell for everyone involved wit the team. The lawsuit was a joke and eventually tossed out of court but it took years and ruined years of these kids childhoods involvement in this sport and was a nuissance for the coaches and all the other volunteers involved.

Bottom line go find a lawyer who deals in defamation and I think this wont go very far unless the coach has really deep pockets and just wants to hurt the author of the email by dragging this out in court and racking up the legal fees.

My parents are what you would consider to be wealthy and deal with everything through this lawyer, estate, land issues, corporation creation and dissolusion etc - he has garnered ALOT of cash (family friend).

He said you could fight it but that there were no current defammation suits in Canada regarding email sent through 3rd party so it might end up to be one of those landmark cases that cost 50K+ for what a simple apology letter would save.

Also the team/person suing has a parent who is a lawyer who is working pro-bono. I checked his credentials, he is a big wig tax attorney who likely has deep enough pockets.

MYK

[mykalberta]

Originally Posted by Flames in 07

An ethical one. If a lawyer truely doesn't feel like his side has a legit chance they should not take the case.

As for this particular case I would be curous what the 'assumed' damages could possibly be. The coach can't coach softball anymore? If so I'm not sure Cdn law allows for significan financial compensation here.

Your friend may want to look for folks to could act as witnesses that could verify that ALL of what the email says is true.

They have video evidence of the "sandbagging"

This has gone on with this team for years. There is video evidence of both games, if are familiar with ball, players and especially the pitchers make all the difference. Each year they played eachother 3 times, twice in local Sherwood park tournaments, Edmonton waxed the team 12-4 and 9-2 in both games (similar score the year before) where the "starters" played. In the game for provincial qualificatons Edmonton sat their starting pitcher and nubmer 1-6 in their batting order and subsequently lost 8-3.

The "sandbagging is evident. The problem seems to lie with Minor Ball/Soccer in that its ok to sandbag, as i said above, and Edmonton/Calgary team can choose to go C provincials withouth penalty.

MYK

[mykalberta]

Originally Posted by photon

Agree, a good lawyer should give advice on how likely the case is to succeed.

Yeah assumed damages just means they don't need to put a dollar figure on it, it's assumed that the damage has taken place. As you say I think this is partially because you don't get the huge $$'s you see elsewhere. If the lawsuit was won then the remedy would maybe just be a public apology, who knows.



Yeah I think the prosecution would have to first prove that what was said was said. Email's probably pretty easy, they'd get the emails from all computers and servers involved.

Hm, interesting I've never read the qualified privilege before, though that seems more of a social good type situation. Not sure how that would apply in this case.

It would boil down to is the accusation of "sandbagging" true. Proving that it is would be tough, how exactly would you prove it? Maybe getting tapes from parents of games, testimony? That all sounds pretty involved, and expensive lawyer wise.

There is video evidence dating back 2 years of this team with the same tactics - there is a longer history that dates back 8 years with this same team/coach/manager where they got beat by "us" in A Provincials when my dad coached, the team filed formal protests against my dad and his coaching techniques - my dad subsequently quit because at his age he doesnt need to deal with that "bs".

Their (Edmonton team) excuse when taken before minor ball board was that they were "resting" their players.

The lawyer said that you could fight but its all about how much you are willing to spend. There are lawyers out there who will send these letters to try to "bully" people who might not have the means to fight.

An "apology" letter has already been sent but my dad is willing to pay the legal fees (because he really hates this Edmonton coach) to see this through if the letter isnt accepted of its forced to be a more public apology.

The lawyer said that since the one in Edmonton is working pro-bono that he can be held libel for damages if they decide to counter sue.

I dont know the details of what they are asking but needless to say its been a long week and could get longer if they decide to be pricks about it.

MYK

[mykalberta]

Originally Posted by corporatejay

I'm not really following you, you've got too many "friend this of a friend"

just lay it out like "x said this about y" or whatever.

btw, if x says something mean to y but no one else hears it, it's not defamation.

and calling someone an oiler fan on this board isn't defamation.

???

It was an analogy for this board.

Also, if someone called me a greasers fan to my face that person would have a serious problem if it wasnt meant as a joke. This is CALGARYPUCK after all.

Also, due to this whole thing I have started to try to cover myself more and more with email conversations at work (basically BCC everything to our corporate lawyer) and review my posts 5 times before I hit reply.

MYK

[llama64]

If there is video evidence of the supposed "sandbagging" and it is viable, there shouldn't be any concern. The allegations will prove to be correct and the suit will be dismissed. Are there any mechanisms in place to recover the costs of legal defense in this case?

Slightly off topic:
Why would a team deliberately lose games in order to "win"? Do I understand the term "sandbag" correctly in this sense?
I mean, how can this team claim to be the top ball team in Edmonton and then deliberately compete at a lower level to win a tournament? This kind of action doesn't make sense for anyone who really wants to win since they arn't winning anything worth their talent. But that's just how I see it.

[SeeGeeWhy]

Hopefully the case gets thrown out as frivolous. Sounds like the person doing the suing has a big time future as a major league exec if their ego is so big they can't take an accusation of being a sandbagger.

I guess that B League championship is worth thousands of dollars in legal fees.

What a joke.

[photon]

Originally Posted by mykalberta

The lawyer said that you could fight but its all about how much you are willing to spend. There are lawyers out there who will send these letters to try to "bully" people who might not have the means to fight.

An "apology" letter has already been sent but my dad is willing to pay the legal fees (because he really hates this Edmonton coach) to see this through if the letter isnt accepted of its forced to be a more public apology.

Yeah, I know what you mean. This forum gets its fair share of that actually. I hate legal bullies.

I hope he carries it through, no one likes a bully.

[mykalberta]

Originally Posted by llama64

If there is video evidence of the supposed "sandbagging" and it is viable, there shouldn't be any concern. The allegations will prove to be correct and the suit will be dismissed. Are there any mechanisms in place to recover the costs of legal defense in this case?

Slightly off topic:
Why would a team deliberately lose games in order to "win"? Do I understand the term "sandbag" correctly in this sense?
I mean, how can this team claim to be the top ball team in Edmonton and then deliberately compete at a lower level to win a tournament? This kind of action doesn't make sense for anyone who really wants to win since they arn't winning anything worth their talent. But that's just how I see it.

They purposefully lose games to "B" ranked communities in order to justify to Minor ball there entrance into the B ranked Provincials. The problem is Minor ball has no current directive that Edmonton/Calgary teams must to "A" so this practice keeps going on. Calgary's "Top" team went C last year in the 13-14 age bracket, whats funny is their 3rd team went B and second team went A. I am using ranking based on tournament play vs each other since there is no set in stone ranking.

I am also perplexed as to why they would purposefully lose games but it does happen and I think it happens if communities ever decide to protest. Its all for not since Alberta Minor Ball has no rule about it though.

My sisters team is in kind of a quandry because the local minor sports body says they cant go down in rankings for Provincials. They are a 10-35K town so they have to go minimum B. When the town gets +35K they will be forced to go A - they are a looong way away from that though.

One wonder what kind of peson would sandbag a lower level tournament just to guarantee to win.

MYK

[Cowboy89]

Originally Posted by mykalberta

They purposefully lose games to "B" ranked communities in order to justify to Minor ball there entrance into the B ranked Provincials. The problem is Minor ball has no current directive that Edmonton/Calgary teams must to "A" so this practice keeps going on. Calgary's "Top" team went C last year in the 13-14 age bracket, whats funny is their 3rd team went B and second team went A. I am using ranking based on tournament play vs each other since there is no set in stone ranking.

I am also perplexed as to why they would purposefully lose games but it does happen and I think it happens if communities ever decide to protest. Its all for not since Alberta Minor Ball has no rule about it though.

My sisters team is in kind of a quandry because the local minor sports body says they cant go down in rankings for Provincials. They are a 10-35K town so they have to go minimum B. When the town gets +35K they will be forced to go A - they are a looong way away from that though.

One wonder what kind of peson would sandbag a lower level tournament just to guarantee to win.

MYK

I agree, what kind of person teaches teenage girls to sandbag? It says a lot about a person/people who need to beat down on lessers in order to feel better about themselves. I've played a fair share of competitive sports growing up and not once was it ever considered okay or even mildly acceptable to actively try to lose any game that was played. I have come across coaches who try to do things somewhat offside to win games, but that's for another thread.

[mykalberta]

Originally Posted by Cowboy89

I agree, what kind of person teaches teenage girls to sandbag? It says a lot about a person/people who need to beat down on lessers in order to feel better about themselves. I've played a fair share of competitive sports growing up and not once was it ever considered okay or even mildly acceptable to actively try to lose any game that was played. I have come across coaches who try to do things somewhat offside to win games, but that's for another thread.

This team/coach/manager has a history of this.

As mentioned above our team beat this team in the A provincials when the girls were 7-8, just one of those years when the pitcher (extremely important at that age due to lack of girls dexterity in hitting, most games were walk, then another etc until someone gets walked in or a hit miraculously happens) my sister happened to be the pitcher and no one could hit off her and she never walked anyone. I

will never forget this sunday evening, dad is coaching and they are up 3-0 in top of 4th when their coaches start yelling things out while my sister is in the pitching motion like, "Come on person X, you can hit of this pitcher" and other things, not directed at my sister directly but this a definate no no even if its not written down especially with girls and especially at that age.

My dad go so furious that he started calling time outs before each pitch (completely legal in the rules but underhanded since games are timed and dont go over past 5th inning unless 90 minutes has passed) until the other team stopped it. Ended up winning 6-2 and the Edmonton team filed a protest.

MYK

[monkeyman]

man what a dirtbag. I hope your friend fights and wins. sounds like this other coach needs to be taught a lesson. please keep us updated.