Opinion
9185 Index 154895/17
05-02-2019
Mikhail FRIDMAN, et al., Plaintiffs–Appellants, v. BUZZFEED, INC., et al., Defendants–Respondents.
Carter Ledyard & Milburn LLP, New York (Alan S. Lewis of counsel), for appellants. Davis Wright Tremaine LLP, New York (Nathan Siegel of counsel), for respondents.
Carter Ledyard & Milburn LLP, New York (Alan S. Lewis of counsel), for appellants.
Davis Wright Tremaine LLP, New York (Nathan Siegel of counsel), for respondents.
Sweeny, J.P., Gische, Webber, Kahn, Moulton, JJ.
Order, Supreme Court, New York County (Arlene P. Bluth, J.), entered May 7, 2018, which, insofar as appealed from, denied plaintiffs' motion to dismiss defendants' first affirmative defense, unanimously affirmed, without costs.
As in Gubarev v. BuzzFeed, Inc. (2018 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 97246 [S.D. Fla. 2018] ), the motion court properly denied plaintiffs' motion to dismiss defendants' first affirmative defense—the fair and true report privilege as codified in New York Civil Rights Law section 74 —which shields publishers from civil liability for claims of defamation when the alleged defamatory statements are published to report accurately about official government activity. While the instant case involves a different set of alleged defamatory statements than Gubarev , we find that, as in that case, an ordinary reader of the publications at issue here, a BuzzFeed article, which hyperlinked a CNN article and the embedded dossier compiled by Christopher Steele, which included a confidential report containing the alleged defamatory statements about plaintiffs, would have concluded that there were official proceedings, such as classified briefings and/or an FBI investigation concerning the dossier as a whole, including the confidential report relating to plaintiffs.