A retired sheriff Andy Colborn had filed a lawsuit against ‘Making A Murderer’ docu-series creators Moira Demos, Laura Ricciardi and Netflix for falsely accusing him of planting evidence.
On Friday, March 10, the US District Court Judge, Brett Ludwig threw out the lawsuit as the sheriff had failed to show that Netflix had acted with ‘actual malice’ in crafting their portrayal of him.
‘Making A Murderer’ was premiered in 2015. It became a breakout hit for Netflix and turned out to be a true-crime boom on the streaming platform. Andy Colborn had filed the lawsuit in 2018 stating that he had been subjected to worldwide ridicule due to the series. The lawsuit also claimed that Netflix and the creators had altered testimony and omitted key information to falsely portray Colborn as a corrupt officer who planted evidence.
On Friday, judge Brett Ludwing finally dropped the lawsuit by stating, “The First Amendment does not guarantee a public figure like Colborn the role of protagonist in popular discourse, in fact, it protects the media’s ability to cast him in a much less flattering light.”
According to Variety, the judge found out that that seven other statements in the series are indisputably true; therefore, they are protected from defamation claims. Even a bar patron stated, “I only have one word, from the cops on up; it’s corruption. Big time. I mean, if people dig far enough, they will see that.”
Hence in the end, Ludwig further stated, “To do as Defendants wish and lump this kind of prestige TV in with meat and potatoes beat reporting would expand the scope of the fair report privilege to a degree that is inconsistent with the common law or existing First Amendment authorities. To the extent it qualifies as journalism, it often hews closer to gonzo than objective and its visual language could be read to suggest something perhaps more nefarious than the totality of the evidence warrants.”
