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Barnes v. O'Connell

Imputation of the crime of theft to a person is actionable per se without proof of special damages.

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Andrew O’Connell and his father, Joseph O’Connell, sued Joe Barnes and Tammy Barnes for slander. A jury awarded Andrew O’Connell $6,000 and awarded Joseph O’Connell $175,000. The Barneses appeal, alleging the $175,000 award to Joseph O’Connell is both unsupported by the evidence and excessive. We disagree and affirm the judgment entered on the jury’s verdict. The evidence shows that the Barneses hired Andrew O’Connell to appraise their coin collection. After spending an entire day cataloging and packaging the coins, Andrew took the coin collection to his father’s coin shop, where he, Joseph O’Connell, and another witness appraised the coin collection. Joseph O’Connell owned O’Connells Coins and Jewelry in Columbus. He had worked in the coin business since the age of 14, and he had appraised thousands of coin collections for banks, estates, and individuals. He had an unblemished reputation in the area for 40 years.

Following Andrew O’Connell’s appraisal of their coin collection, the Barneses claimed that numerous valuable coins were missing or had been switched by Andrew O’Connell. They reported this to the Columbus Police Department, and Andrew O’Connell was arrested. The Barneses appeared on a local news channel warning others that their valuable coin collection had been stolen by Andrew O’Connell, lamenting that they had known the O’Connells their whole lives and trusted them, and commenting that there were probably other victims out there who had their coins switched during an appraisal. Coin dealers and coin collectors learned of the accusations through television broadcasts accusing the O’Connells of switching the coins and message boards on the Professional Coin Grading Service web site blogging about the situation.

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