Tribe's suit against Times is dismissed

By Times staff writer

© St. Petersburg Times, published April 29, 2000

A circuit judge in Broward County has thrown out a lawsuit filed by the Seminole Tribe of Florida against the St. Petersburg Times and two of its reporters.

Judge J. Leonard Fleet dismissed a lawsuit filed in 1999 by the tribe, which accused the newspaper of interfering with the tribe's business practices and violating civil and criminal laws. The ruling prevents the tribe from refiling its lawsuit in Circuit Court, but it can appeal to the 4th District Court of Appeal, based in West Palm Beach.

The core of the tribe's amended lawsuit accused Times reporters of interfering by interviewing employees about the tribe's business and asking them to reveal confidential financial information.

Even if reporters had done that, Fleet ruled, the tribe could not sue them or the Times for trying to gather news.

"One of the things that this case presented was whether or not it is illegal or improper for a newspaper person to ask for information that an employer might not want to get out," said Alison Steele, an attorney for the Times. "Asking is not wrong. I think that is the point. "Journalists have to be able to ask," Steele added. "I can't begin to think about the news -- important news -- we would never know unless someone had the courage to tell. So it's not wrong to ask."

While the tribe could not sue the newspaper, the judge noted that it might be able to sue employees who spoke to the Times. Those employees could be liable for breaching confidentiality agreements, he said.

Reporters for the Times conducted interviews and researched public records for a 1997 series about the tribe's gambling interests, casinos and its chairman, Chief James Billie.

The Times did not violate computer theft laws or coerce employees into revealing secrets, as the tribe alleged, Steele said. "It just did not happen," she said.

The tribe did not accuse the Times of defamation or falsely reporting anything of substance in its 1997 articles, the judge noted. It can't now file a libel suit since the statute of limitations for such a suit has run out, Steele said.

Fleet also refused to issue an injunction that the tribe sought to prevent the Times from reporting on the tribe's activities. "The enormity of such a request cannot be adequately quantified!" Fleet wrote. "(W)hen relief is sought under the United States Constitution, relief must be denied when the grant thereof would transgress its great principles."

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