MEMORANDUM
From: Glaser, Weil, Fink, Jacobs, Howard & Shapiro, LLP
To: Daniel M. Snyder
Re: Possible Legal Action Against the Washington City Paper
Mr Snyder:
As you requested, we've been researching your legal options in regards to the Washington City Paper's article entitled "The Cranky Redskins Fan's Guide to Dan Snyder," which you claim is libelous and/or defamatory in nature. After a careful review of both the article and past items written about you by journalist Dave McKenna, we have to be perfectly frank: Our chances of prevailing in court under these circumstances don't look good.
Largely, any potential litigation will be hamstrung by your own admission to us that nothing significant in the article is patently untrue. While there may well indeed be one or two minor factual errors in the article (i.e., McKenna claims that Asians auditioning for a mascot job at Six Flags were told to "act like Charlie Chan," whereas you say that in actuality, they were directed to act like "the funny, bucktoothed Chinaman from Breakfast at Tiffany's"), these will be unlikely to convince a judge as to the merits of our case when the defendant(s) argues for summary judgment.
Further, while investigating the veracity of the items listed in the City Paper, we've discovered that many of them are actually far, far worse than what appeared in print. For example, this excerpt of the article:
"Ewwwww!": How Barbara Hyde, spokeswoman for the American Society for Microbiology, reacted to last year's news that Snyder's vendors were selling beer in the bathrooms. Fans had been alleging that the Redskins were hawking lager in the loo long before a YouTube video surfaced in October 2009. Hyde said that because microbiological bad actors like E. coli hang out in the men's room, beer vendors shouldn't.
Regardless of whether McKenna didn't uncover the fact that the sale of beer in restrooms was directed by you personally in your August 25, 2006 memo entitled "Maximizing Our Revenue Streams No Matter How Many Redskins Fans Have to Die of E. coli" (attached) or he simply felt he'd done enough damage with the article as it was and didn't need to go for the jugular, a lawsuit may well bring many of these unsavory facts to light, not to mention, heretofore completely unreported ones. Recall how much negative publicity you and the team received when the Post reported that the Redskins were suing indigent season ticket holders, and consider how much worse the reaction would be if, in the discovery process, it was revealed that you had smuggled dozens of Haitian orphans into the country after the earthquake, and keep them locked up underneath FedEx Field where, on game day, they're forced to peddle bicycles hooked up to generators in order to provide free electricity for the video monitor.
As to your suggestion that a successful lawsuit could be based simply on the premise that people shouldn't be allowed to criticize the wealthy and powerful in this country, it's a novel legal argument, but not one we feel would have much traction in court. Specifically, the Virginia statute you cited in your letter to us hasn't been relied on in any court in well over a century, and in fact, was mainly used pre-Civil War to allow landowners to beat insubordinate slaves without fear of punishment. Frankly, no one here can figure out why this statute hasn't been repealed, but we strongly suggest, for reasons having to do with public relations just as much as the law, that you not--emphasize, not--attempt to make this the centerpiece of any defamation suit you might bring.
Our best chance, it seems, might well be to rattle our sabers and merely threaten to file a lawsuit unless McKenna is fired. The City Paper's owners have been on shaky financial ground, and could decide that acquiescing to our demands would be cheaper than a long, drawn out litigation battle. The danger here, of course, would be that you would look like a petty, overly-sensitive asshole with a Napoleon complex, and that whatever small amount of goodwill you've improbably developed with the Redskins fan base over the past few months would instantly evaporate, once again making you the undisputed laughingstock of the NFL.
But hey, it's your team.
From: Glaser, Weil, Fink, Jacobs, Howard & Shapiro, LLP
To: Daniel M. Snyder
Re: Possible Legal Action Against the Washington City Paper
Mr Snyder:
As you requested, we've been researching your legal options in regards to the Washington City Paper's article entitled "The Cranky Redskins Fan's Guide to Dan Snyder," which you claim is libelous and/or defamatory in nature. After a careful review of both the article and past items written about you by journalist Dave McKenna, we have to be perfectly frank: Our chances of prevailing in court under these circumstances don't look good.
Largely, any potential litigation will be hamstrung by your own admission to us that nothing significant in the article is patently untrue. While there may well indeed be one or two minor factual errors in the article (i.e., McKenna claims that Asians auditioning for a mascot job at Six Flags were told to "act like Charlie Chan," whereas you say that in actuality, they were directed to act like "the funny, bucktoothed Chinaman from Breakfast at Tiffany's"), these will be unlikely to convince a judge as to the merits of our case when the defendant(s) argues for summary judgment.
Further, while investigating the veracity of the items listed in the City Paper, we've discovered that many of them are actually far, far worse than what appeared in print. For example, this excerpt of the article:
"Ewwwww!": How Barbara Hyde, spokeswoman for the American Society for Microbiology, reacted to last year's news that Snyder's vendors were selling beer in the bathrooms. Fans had been alleging that the Redskins were hawking lager in the loo long before a YouTube video surfaced in October 2009. Hyde said that because microbiological bad actors like E. coli hang out in the men's room, beer vendors shouldn't.
Regardless of whether McKenna didn't uncover the fact that the sale of beer in restrooms was directed by you personally in your August 25, 2006 memo entitled "Maximizing Our Revenue Streams No Matter How Many Redskins Fans Have to Die of E. coli" (attached) or he simply felt he'd done enough damage with the article as it was and didn't need to go for the jugular, a lawsuit may well bring many of these unsavory facts to light, not to mention, heretofore completely unreported ones. Recall how much negative publicity you and the team received when the Post reported that the Redskins were suing indigent season ticket holders, and consider how much worse the reaction would be if, in the discovery process, it was revealed that you had smuggled dozens of Haitian orphans into the country after the earthquake, and keep them locked up underneath FedEx Field where, on game day, they're forced to peddle bicycles hooked up to generators in order to provide free electricity for the video monitor.
As to your suggestion that a successful lawsuit could be based simply on the premise that people shouldn't be allowed to criticize the wealthy and powerful in this country, it's a novel legal argument, but not one we feel would have much traction in court. Specifically, the Virginia statute you cited in your letter to us hasn't been relied on in any court in well over a century, and in fact, was mainly used pre-Civil War to allow landowners to beat insubordinate slaves without fear of punishment. Frankly, no one here can figure out why this statute hasn't been repealed, but we strongly suggest, for reasons having to do with public relations just as much as the law, that you not--emphasize, not--attempt to make this the centerpiece of any defamation suit you might bring.
Our best chance, it seems, might well be to rattle our sabers and merely threaten to file a lawsuit unless McKenna is fired. The City Paper's owners have been on shaky financial ground, and could decide that acquiescing to our demands would be cheaper than a long, drawn out litigation battle. The danger here, of course, would be that you would look like a petty, overly-sensitive asshole with a Napoleon complex, and that whatever small amount of goodwill you've improbably developed with the Redskins fan base over the past few months would instantly evaporate, once again making you the undisputed laughingstock of the NFL.
But hey, it's your team.
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