Since 2001 Findgreatlawyers.com has been the leading internet resource to find Illinois lawyers and Illinois legal information

Defamation Lawyers in Illinois

Injury to a person’s reputation can sometimes hurt more than a physical injury, and have longer lasting effects. Illinois law addresses the unwarranted reputational injury caused by another’s words through its defamation laws.

“Defamation” is an untrue statement made about a person that lowers how he or she is viewed in the community, or deters others from associating with him or her. In Illinois, defamation includes both slander—the spoken word, and libel—the written word.

The makings of a claim for defamation:

In order to be defamation, a statement must have been made which was substantially untrue about the Plaintiff, was not privileged, was communicated to a third party, and which caused injury to the plaintiff’s reputation. Not every hurtful statement by someone else can subject them to a defamation claim, however.

First, the statement has to be false. A statement about someone else which is essentially true can be hurtful and cause them damage to their reputation, but will generally not be actionable.

In addition, the statement will not be legally defamatory if it not a statement of fact—but rather an expression of an idea or opinion. Even if defamatory, ideas and opinions are combated by expression of opposing viewpoints, and not lawsuits. A person cannot, though, “hide” a false statement within a statement that seems like an opinion. If the expression of an opinion or idea is partly factual, or implies that it is based on undisclosed facts, then it could be actionable as defamation.

If the plaintiff is not identified in the statement, then he or she should not be able to claim it was defamatory to him or her. Sometimes statements are made regarding a group of people, or some other generalized category. While the plaintiff may know that he or she is included in the statement’s contents, if the third party that received the statement would not reasonably know it was about the plaintiff, it may not be defamatory.

The false statement that identifies the plaintiff also has to be published to some other party besides the plaintiff. Though it can be very upsetting for a person to hear or see something false and potentially harmful about him or herself, if no one else sees or hears it, it cannot make a case for defamation.

In most cases, the plaintiff will have to have suffered actual damage to his or her reputation for there to be an actionable defamation claim. It is important to show the effect of the false statement on the third parties who received it, e.g., the plaintiff now holds a lesser position in their eyes or they are less likely to want to associate with the plaintiff.

The types of defamation claims—who is the plaintiff; what was said?

Defamation claims are treated differently depending upon whether the statement was made about a public person or a private person. Where a typical, private citizen is the plaintiff, he or she will not have to show that the defendant who made the statement did so with intent to harm. The state of mind of the defendant does not come into play in such a case.

On the other hand where the plaintiff is a person of public interest, actual malice must be shown in order to successfully claim defamation. Illinois law recognizes that where people inject themselves into the public arena either through their lives and work generally, or with regard to the particular public controversy that is involved in the defamation, then they willingly accept some less protection for statements made about them. Further, those public people presumably have greater access to other public communication means to attempt to correct the information that is out there about them. Intentional false statements, though, made for the purpose of harming even public people, remain defamatory.

The subject matter of the alleged defamatory statement also has an effect on what needs to be proven by the plaintiff. There are two types of defamatory statements in Illinois: those considered defamatory “per se” where on their face they are defamatory; and defamatory “per quod” where more information is needed to know of the harm to the plaintiff’s reputation.

Illinois law recognizes five categories of statements that are defamatory per se. They are statements that impute the commission of a crime, impute infection with a terrible communicable disease, impute lack of ability or lack of integrity in their employment, harm someone in their trade or profession, and impute adultery or fornication. These kinds of statements are considered so materially harmful in nature that the law will presume the injury to the plaintiff’s reputation, and it will not have to be proven.

If a statement fits within one of the five per se categories, it might not be defamatory, however, if it is reasonably capable of an “innocent construction.” Essentially, this means that courts will take the statement and look at it in its natural context and according to the natural and obvious meanings of the words, and determine if it can have an innocent interpretation.

Damages

Despite everything you have read so far, there are very few successful defamation lawsuits brought in Illinois every year. The reality is that in most cases, the actual financial or other harm suffered does not justify the costs of a lawsuit. We also see many times where it’s hard to prove that the alleged defamation actually caused the harm that you think it did.

For example, if your name is in the paper for having been arrested for a DUI, but you were really arrested for something else, it’s difficult to prove that you really suffered any harm.

Other factors to consider:

There are some contexts in which there is a privilege for making statements that might otherwise be defamatory. For example, statements made in the context of legal proceedings may be privileged from defamation claims.

Also, defamation claims do not survive the death of either the plaintiff or the defendant.

Lastly, the statute of limitations on defamation claims is relatively short—one year from the time that the plaintiff had reason to know of the defamatory statement. This means that once someone knows that this injury has occurred, there is only one year to bring the claim for defamation, or else it will be lost forever. For this reason, it is important not to take too long before consulting with an experienced attorney.

If you think you may have a claim or have any questions regarding defamation cases, please don’t hesitate to contact us to discuss it further. These are challenging cases, but we will certainly evaluate your claim and offer an honest opinion.