I've been waiting for something like this to emerge ever since CAIR wanted to sue the passengers on a US Airways flight who reported suspicious behavior by six imams. Now we have the spectacle of a blogger getting sued for writing about Muslims linked to terror.
Bill Warner has a lot of stories on his site about Muslims trafficking in stolen goods (cars, pirated CDs, DVDs, etc.) and how federal authorities are falling down on the job in pursuing the bad guys in Tampa, Florida.
Naturally, when you start examining a dog with fleas, some of the fleas are gonna jump on you. That's pretty much what has happened with this lawsuit.
(O)n 5/21/2007 I was served summons of Complaint and an Injunction by the Mcintrye Law Firm of Tampa Fl who represent Abdul Raouf M. Dabus in a Defamation Law Suit against myself and my company for supposedly linking Mr. Dabus and his company VIP Motors in Tampa with shipping vehicles to the Middle East for resale in support of terrorism and that Mr. Dabus had worked at the Islamic Academy of Florida with Sami Al-Arain (The School that Terrorism Built) as an instructor from 1999 to an unknown point and that Mr. Dabus was linked to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and that such information is posted on my web site www.wbipi.com .
Clearly, the point of the suit is to shut down Warner's site and to serve as a warning to others not to write about these sorts of events.
Let's look at a bit of libel law.
Libel occurs when one "communicat(es) a statement that makes a false claim, expressly stated or implied to be factual, that may harm the reputation of an individual, business, product, group, government or nation."
First, truth is always a defense. Warner will always have the option of showing the veracity of the statements on his blog. If, in fact, he has information which shows what he wrote is true, then he will have that as a defense.
Second comes the issue of public versus private actors. In this case, Abdul Raouf M. Dabus would probably be considered a private person, therefore subject to a lower standard of culpability.
The most interesting part of this situation is whether Warner will be considered a publisher or not. I'm not sure how many bloggers have been sued as publishers, which is clearly what this is about. As uncomfortable as this is for Warner, his case illuminates the lengths to which people like CAIR are willing to go to shut down any negative publicity.
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