Defamation

Two members of the Lower Gwynedd Zoning Hearing Board yesterday told a Montgomery County court jury that they had no recollection of township Supervisor Janet Kirch saying to them that Frank W. Comfort Jr. "has dealings in heavy drugs. " "I couldn't repeat a word she said," Frank Vitetta, chairman of the Zoning Hearing Board, testified during the fourth day of the defamation trial of Kirch on a lawsuit filed by Comfort. "I think I would have remembered hearing Comfort's name if mentioned that night," said the other Zoning Hearing Board member, Cary Levinson.

WHEN controversial radio host Tarsha "Jonesy" Jones "likes" a business that advertises with Power 99, her listeners trust her "because Miss Jones doesn't hold her tongue," the station says. There's a flip-side to that, one local businesswoman found, and she says that it resulted in her getting death threats, broken windows and a tarnished reputation. In a defamation suit filed in Common Pleas Court yesterday, Tracey Parson said that families pulled their children out of the four Kiddie Kare day-care centers she owns in the city, almost immediately after callers to the "Jonesy in the Morning" show misidentifed her as a mother who had beaten up teenage girls.

A former Newtown Township official has sued three men and their Warminster business for defamation, saying they sent an anonymous letter to several municipalities and the state attorney general accusing him of unlawful behavior. M. Matthew Lahaza, the former township code enforcement officer and Planning Commission member, filed the civil lawsuit Monday in Bucks County Court against Code Inspections Inc. and its shareholders, Gerald J. and Daniel K. Azeff and James R. Cochran. The letter, dated March 30, 1989, accuses Lahaza of "a clear pattern of unlawful behavior, surreptitious double-dealing and ethically questionable behavior.

Springside Chestnut Hill Academy has denied that it defamed and violated the civil rights of a veteran African American math teacher who was fired in the fall for allegedly sending inappropriate text messages to a female student. In documents filed Monday in U.S. District Court, the private school disputed Arthur "Chuck" Matthews' allegations that he was unjustly terminated in September and that the action was part of a pattern of discriminatory practices the "predominately Caucasian" school had engaged in for years.

Former Alabama football coach Mike Price sued Time Inc. for $20 million yesterday, contending he was defamed by a Sports Illustrated article about the strip club visit that led to his firing. The suit seeks $10 million in compensation, the value of the seven-year deal Price had with Alabama, which fired him after his night of alleged drunken carousing in Pensacola, Fla., in April. The suit, filed in state court, seeks another $10 million in punitive damages from Time, which publishes Sports Illustrated.

A Common Pleas Court jury is expected to begin deliberations today on whether a vitriolic leaflet campaign against City Councilman Jack Kelly and "the homosexual agenda" in 2007 was defamatory. Testimony wrapped up yesterday in the civil trial of 80-year-old Paul D. Corbett, sued by Kelly over his guerrilla-style campaign attacks that each side says nearly cost the Republican councilman his at-large seat in the 2007 general election. Corbett spread fliers in the weeks leading up to the Nov. 6 election to force Kelly to change his May 2007 vote to end a dollar-a-year lease agreement between the city and the Boy Scouts' Cradle of Liberty Council that dates back to 1928.

S WILMINGTON - A tenured professor fighting to keep his job at Widener University School of Law in Wilmington has sued the dean for allegedly making defamatory statements in an effort to fire the instructor. Lawrence J. Connell, an associate professor at the school, has accused dean Linda L. Ammons of intentionally making false statements that characterize Connell as a racist and sexist in administrative proceedings to oust the professor. Attorneys for Connell said the suit was filed Friday in Delaware Superior Court.

I'm a gentleman with an unacknowledged handicap. Because of it, I'm the butt of jokes, a victim of subtle discrimination and worse, viewed as less than a whole human being. My deficiency - male pattern-baldness, Even the barber laughs at me - what's worse, he still charges full price - but I no longer see the humor in my condition. The theme of baldness-as-a- defect plays loud through our society and can alter a person's whole life. Hair loss is associated with physical weakness, stuffy manners and rapid aging.

A federal judge has denied Eric V. Thomas' attempt to add claims of defamation and emotional distress to his lawsuit against the Ford Motor Co., which the Cape May County dentist alleges is responsible for his wife's death due to a faulty air bag. Ford, which has alleged that Thomas strangled his wife, cannot be sued for statements made while investigating the lawsuit, U.S. District Judge Stephen M. Orlofsky wrote in documents dated Wednesday....

A series of campaign handbills featuring a parody of Folcroft District Justice Anthony M. Truscello as a whip-slinging, chain-wielding tyrant has sparked a defamation suit by him against six political activists from the borough. Truscello alleges in Delaware County Court that the six, all members of the Folcroft New Republican Party, used "defamatory and malicious writings and libels" in an attempt to "blacken" his reputation before the May 20 primary. Truscello was not a candidate in the primary, but his wife, Carolyn, is the Republican Party chairwoman in the borough.