Talk-show host, radio station appeal Potts defamation ruling

POPULAR sports talk-show host Andre E Baptiste and Gem Radio – the owner of radio station I95.5 FM – have appealed a judge’s ruling that they defamed boxing promoter Boxu Potts in a series of broadcasts from 2012-2014.

In September 2018, Justice Margaret Mohammed ordered Baptiste and the radio station to pay a little over $600,000 in compensation to Potts.

The defamatory statements were allegedly made by Baptiste and his guests on his show. However, Potts only sued Baptiste and the radio station.

The guests included boxing administrator Molly Boxhill, boxers Tariq Haqq and Claude Noel, trainer Franchot Moore, amateur coach Floyd Trumpet, and then Boxing Association secretary Mario Robinson.

In her ruling, Mohammed held that Baptiste acted recklessly by permitting defamatory words in two of the three broadcasts without proper verification. She also found both the talk-show host and the station liable for permitting the defamatory words to be aired and broadcast.

In its defence, Baptiste and Gem Radio contended the statements on the programmes were not defamatory and were “fair comment” covered by Reynolds privilege, which provides a degree of protection for responsible journalism when reporting matters of public concern.

However, Mohammed held the more serious the allegation, the more the public is misinformed and the individual harmed if the allegation is not true.

At the appeal, Senior Counsel Ian Benjamin, who represents Baptiste and Gem Radio, said the judge’s findings on fair comment and Reynolds privilege were wrong in law.

“It was fair comment made without malice in a matter of public interest, not that it was alleged to have occurred.”

Benjamin also said there was no evidence the talk-show host made or adopted the statements made by his guests on the programmes. On the Reynolds’ defence, he said it did not require the statements to be established as true. He said the correct approach the judge should have adopted was to apply the Reynolds principle in a flexible, practical manner. Instead, he said she applied it with a rigidity that led her to error.

“We say she ought to have upheld that the privileges of Reynolds applied,” he said, adding that the judge was also wrong in finding the truth of the statements was a necessary element of the Reynolds defence.

In resisting the appeal, attorney Jared Jagroo, who appears for Potts, said the judge made no errors of law and, he contended, correctly applied the law to the facts of the case. He said in her finding, the judge, while finding that the matters discussed on the programmes were in the public interest, held that the broadcasts were not a product of responsible journalism.

Baptiste, he said, "did not take any steps to verify the information or stop the comments.”

Although initially Justices of Appeal Alice Yorke-Soo Hon, Mira Dean-Armorer and Malcolm Holdip said they intended to give their decision shortly after submissions ended, they returned to say they needed more time to consider the arguments.

They adjourned their decision to a date to be fixed.