Court Cuts Back Pete Rose's Defamation Suit Over Ex-Investigator's Statement
A federal court in Pennsylvania has trimmed the claims that former baseball star Pete Rose can bring against the man who investigated him for betting in the 1980s. That man, attorney John Dowd, had acted as special counsel to Major League Baseball, and gave a 2015 radio interview in which, Rose alleged, the lawyer said the ex-player committed statutory rape.
July 17, 2017 at 01:24 PM
4 minute read
A federal court in Pennsylvania has trimmed the claims that former baseball star Pete Rose can bring against the man who investigated him for betting in the 1980s. That man, attorney John Dowd, had acted as special counsel to Major League Baseball, and gave a 2015 radio interview in which, Rose alleged, the lawyer said the ex-player committed statutory rape.
The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania ruled that, although Rose sufficiently pleaded a claim for defamation per se, he failed to properly outline a case for a standard defamation, or show that Dowd tortiously interfered with a sponsorship contract Rose had with the Skechers shoe brand.
Judge Petrese Tucker, who issued the ruling in an 11-page opinion July 14, said Rose failed to show he suffered “special harm” in connection with his defamation claim. Turning to Rose's count of tortious interference with a contract, the baseball player's claim that Dowd's statement caused Skechers to drop its endorsement contract with the baseball star also wasn't plausible, Tucker said.
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