Re: 6/14/01 - [HEB] Law.com: D.C. Court of Appeals Reverses Denial of Appellants' Motion to Dismiss (part 1 of 2)
Finkelstein, Thompson & Loughran and Enright v. Hemispherz Biopharma, Inc.
D.C. Ct. App.
June 14, 2001
Glickman, Associate Judge
99-CV-338
Appeal from the Superior Court of the District of Columbia Hon. Brook Hedge, Trial Judge
Argued February 29, 2000
Appellee Hemispherx Biopharma, Inc. ("Hemispherx") sued appellants Donald J. Enright and his law firm Finkelstein, Thompson & Loughran, claiming that Enright slandered it when he solicited one of Hemispherx's shareholders as a client in order to bring a potential shareholders' derivative or class action lawsuit against Hemispherx. Invoking the absolute privilege recognized in this jurisdiction for defamatory statements by an attorney that are preliminary to a proposed judicial proceeding, appellants moved to dismiss the defamation count of the complaint. The trial court denied the requested relief, and appellants filed the instant interlocutory appeal.
The principal issues we address are whether we have jurisdiction, and if so whether the so-called "judicial proceedings privilege" may extend to statements made by an attorney in an initial consultation with a prospective client from whom the attorney is "soliciting" employment. We hold that we do have jurisdiction, because the denial of a claim of absolute immunity from suit is immediately appealable under the collateral order doctrine. We further hold that the judicial proceedings privilege is available, if its requirements are met, to cover statements made by an attorney to a prospective client in a pre-retention meeting.
Applying the latter holding to the complaint in this case, we conclude that on the facts as alleged, Enright's statements to Hemispherx's shareholder were absolutely privileged as a matter of law. Accordingly, we reverse the denial of appellants' motion to dismiss.
I.
As alleged in its complaint, *fn1 Hemispherx is a publicly traded corporation engaged in experimental drug research and development. The company's principal focus has been the clinical testing and promotion of an anti-viral compound known as Ampligen for the possible treatment of chronic fatigue syndrome, hepatitis and other serious medical conditions. Preliminary results allegedly have been encouraging, and the FDA has granted Ampligen investigative new drug status.
In September 1998, however, an analyst named Manuel P. Asensio published over the Internet a "strong sell recommendation" for Hemispherx's common stock, along with a research report that severely criticized the company and its Chief Executive Officer, Dr. William A. Carter. According to the complaint, the report was libelous and contained numerous misstatements and omissions of material fact. Nonetheless, Asensio's comments were picked up and reported in the September 28, 1998, issue of Business Week. Within a matter of days, the price of Hemispherx's stock, which was traded on the American Stock Exchange, dropped from around $13 per share to approximately $5 per share. *fn2
Prior to September 28, 1998, shareholders posted messages concerning Hemispherx on an electronic bulletin board devoted to the company that was maintained on the "Yahoo!" Internet site. On or about that date, the complaint alleges, appellants Finkelstein, Thompson & Loughran, a Washington, D.C. law firm (hereinafter, "FTL"), and Donald J. Enright, an attorney associated with that firm, sent an unsolicited electronic mail message to a shareholder (identified only as "Shareholder A") who had previously posted a message on the Hemispherx bulletin board. The message to Shareholder A stated that FTL "handles plaintiffs' class action law suits in the securities field" and that it is "investigating Hemispherx Biopharma Inc. at this time." The message invited Shareholder A to contact Enright if he was "interested in discussing this matter further."
Shareholder A, who was not a client of Enright or FTL, apparently was interested in discussing "this matter" with them, for he telephoned Enright in response to the e-mail message and spoke with him for nearly an hour. The following day, Shareholder A sent Hemispherx a letter recounting what Enright said to him, together with contemporaneous notes of the conversation. Shareholder A also transmitted a report to the Hemispherx bulletin board at Yahoo!
According to Shareholder A, Enright said that he "specializes in finding `bogus' companies to sue." He had been in communication with Asensio, and he claimed that he agreed with Asensio's report on Hemispherx except for minor details. Enright said that Ampligen was "a drug looking for a disease." It had "been around" for over ten years, and had been considered as a possible treatment for one disease after another; this, Enright said, "was no way a `real' pharmaceutical company went about pursuing new drug research." Enright reportedly added that Hemispherx had no proprietary rights to Ampligen, and that therefore anyone would be able to make and sell the drug after it received FDA approval. Further, Enright allegedly stated that Dr. Carter was less than trustworthy, *fn3 and that he and other Hemispherx executives might be transferring money into secret accounts and passing off warrants so as to leave a shell company for the shareholders. Enright suggested that his law firm could recover the shareholders' losses by pursuing any directors' and officers' liability insurance that Hemispherx had in place.
The complaint claims that Enright's statements that Hemispherx had no proprietary rights in Ampligen, and that Carter and other executives might be secreting money and issuing warrants to cheat the shareholders by leaving them with a shell company, were false and misleading. The first count of the complaint charges appellants with defamation; and it alleges that "Enright's statements were made with malice, in that they were made with knowledge of or with reckless disregard for the truth." A second count charges that Enright also violated Rule 7.1 (b) of the District of Columbia Rules of Professional Conduct, by making materially false and misleading statements in soliciting Shareholder A as a potential client. The complaint seeks an order enjoining FTL and Enright from soliciting its shareholders as their clients in class or derivative litigation based on false and misleading statements, and an award of compensatory damages "in excess of $5,000."
Appellants moved to dismiss the complaint pursuant to Super. Ct. Civ. R. 12 (b)(6). They sought dismissal of the defamation count on the principal ground that Enright's statements were absolutely privileged as statements preliminary to a proposed judicial proceeding. In opposition, Hemispherx argued that in the District of Columbia the judicial proceedings privilege had never been held to protect statements made by an attorney in the course of soliciting a client, and that the privilege is properly limited to "statements made in the regular course of an existing or imminent judicial proceeding . . . in which the attorney is acting as counsel." *fn4
The trial court denied the motion to dismiss the defamation count without opinion. FTL and Enright promptly noted this appeal. *fn5
II.
Along with the overwhelming majority of the States, the District of Columbia has long recognized an absolute privilege for statements made preliminary to, or in the course of, a judicial proceeding, so long as the statements bear some relation to the proceeding. We have adopted the articulation of the so-called "judicial proceedings" privilege that is set forth in § 586 of the Restatement (Second) of Torts (1977):
An attorney at law is absolutely privileged to publish defamatory matter concerning another in communications preliminary to a proposed judicial proceeding, or in the institution of, or during the course and as a part of, a judicial proceeding in which he participates as counsel, if it has some relation to the proceeding. See McBride v. Pizza Hut, Inc., 658 A.2d 205, 207-08 (D.C. 1995); see also Arneja v. Gildar, 541 A.2d 621, 623 (D.C. 1988) ("[f]or the absolute immunity of the privilege to apply, two requirements must be satisfied: (1) the statement must have been made in the course of or preliminary to a judicial proceeding; and (2) the statement must be related in some way to the underlying proceeding"); Mohler v. Houston, 356 A.2d 646, 647 (D.C. 1976) (per curiam) (citing § 586 of the 1938 version of the Restatement of Torts); Brown v. Collins, 131 U.S. App. D.C. 68, 71, 402 F.2d 209, 212 (1968) (noting that the Restatement of Torts states "the American rule that no defamation action may be grounded on . . . statements preliminary to or in the course of a judicial proceeding so long as the defamatory matter `has some relation' - a standard broader than legal relevance - to the proceeding").
The judicial proceedings privilege is "based upon a public policy of securing to attorneys as officers of the court the utmost freedom in their efforts to secure justice for their clients." Restatement (Second) of Torts § 586 comment a. To that end, the privilege is absolute rather than qualified: it "protects the attorney from liability in an action for defamation irrespective of his purpose in publishing the defamatory matter, his belief in its truth, or even his knowledge of its falsity." Id. The intent of the privilege is not, of course, to encourage lawyers to defame, nor to protect lawyers who do so in bad faith, though in some instances that may be a regrettable (indeed, a deplorable) side effect of recognizing the existence of the privilege. Rather, the intent of the privilege is to free honorable lawyers to render candid and zealous advice and representation to their clients without fear of retaliatory harassment from their adversaries. See Arneja, 541 A.2d at 624. "The [absolute privilege] exists, not because the malicious conduct of [lawyers] ought not to be actionable, but because, if their conduct were actionable, actions would be brought against them in cases in which they had not spoken falsely and maliciously . . . ." Van Vechten Veeder, Absolute Immunity in Defamation: Judicial Proceedings (Part I), 9 Colum. L. Rev. 463, 469-70 (1909). *fn6
Appellants argue that the trial court erred in denying their motion to dismiss because - accepting the allegations of the complaint as true and construing them in the light most favorable to Hemispherx -Enright's allegedly defamatory statements to Shareholder A were preliminary to a proposed judicial proceeding and bore some relation to that proceeding, and thus were absolutely privileged. Hemispherx counters that the absolute privilege envisioned in § 586 of the Restatement and prior decisions in this jurisdiction is available only to an attorney who is acting on behalf of an existing client in an ongoing legal dispute or proceeding. Hemispherx contends that the absolute privilege is not available to an attorney who is merely soliciting a prospective client for a potential lawsuit that the attorney suggests they might pursue.
A.
Before addressing the merits of the parties' contentions, we must first consider our jurisdiction to proceed with this interlocutory appeal. This court has jurisdiction to review "final orders and judgments" of the Superior Court. See D.C. Code § 11-721 (a)(1) (1995). "Final orders" have been defined as those that "dispose[] of the whole case on its merits so that the court has nothing remaining to do but to execute the judgment or decree already rendered." In re Estate of Chuong, 623 A.2d 1154, 1157 (D.C. 1993) (en banc) (quoting McBryde v. Metropolitan Life Ins. Co., 221 A.2d 718, 720 (D.C. 1966)). The denial of a motion to dismiss a complaint is not a final order in this sense and hence is usually not immediately appealable. *fn7
Under the collateral order doctrine, however, a ruling such as the denial of a motion to dismiss may be appealable if it has "a final and irreparable effect on important rights of the parties." Bible Way Church of Our Lord Jesus Christ of the Apostolic Faith v. Beards, 680 A.2d 419, 425 (D.C. 1996) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). To qualify for immediate appellate review, the ruling must satisfy three requirements: (1) it must conclusively determine a disputed question of law; (2) it must resolve an important issue that is separate from the merits of the case; and (3) it must be effectively unreviewable on appeal from a final judgment. Id. at 425-26; see also In re Ti. B., 762 A.2d 20, 25 (D.C. 2000).
The denial of a motion that asserts an immunity from being sued is the kind of ruling that is commonly found to meet the requirements of the collateral order doctrine and thus be immediately appealable, so long as the ruling turns on an issue of law rather than on a factual dispute. See generally Johnson v. Jones, 515 U.S. 304, 313 (1995); Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 525-29 (1985). This court, for example, has held that a defendant church may appeal the denial of a motion to dismiss based on a claim of immunity from suit under the First Amendment. See Bible Way Church, 680 A.2d at 426; United Methodist Church, Baltimore Annual Conference v. White, 571 A.2d 790, 792-93 (D.C. 1990). In defamation actions, other courts likewise have held that the denial of a motion to dismiss or for summary judgment based on a claim of absolute privilege under the common law - deemed equivalent to a claim of absolute immunity - is immediately appealable under the collateral order doctrine. See Shanks v. AlliedSignal, Inc., 169 F.3d 988, 991-92 (5th Cir. 1999); Boice v. Unisys Corp., 50 F.3d 1145, 1148-49 (2d Cir. 1995).
Consistent with these cases, we hold that we have jurisdiction to hear the appeal of FTL and Enright from the denial of their motion to dismiss based on their claim of absolute privilege. The determining consideration is that the judicial proceedings privilege is more than a defense to liability. The privilege is intended to "afford[] an attorney absolute immunity from actions in defamation for communications related to judicial proceedings." Arneja, 541 A.2d at 623 (emphasis added). The essence of an immunity from suit is "an entitlement not to stand trial or face the other burdens of litigation." Mitchell, 472 U.S. at 526. "The doctrine of absolute immunity for statements in judicial proceedings reflects a judgment that the need for completely free speech for litigants is dominant, and that this freedom is not to be endangered by subjecting parties to the burden of defending their motives in subsequent slander litigation, or to the risk that juries may misapprehend those motives." Brown, 131 U.S. App. D.C. at 72, 402 F.2d at 213. *fn8
From the fact that the judicial proceedings privilege affords an absolute immunity from suit, it follows that the criteria of appealability under the collateral order doctrine are satisfied in this case. First, in denying the motion to dismiss and thereby requiring FTL and Enright to defend the litigation, the trial court "conclusively determined (by rejecting)" their claim of immunity. Bible Way Church, 680 A.2d at 426. Second, the issue of immunity from having to defend against Hemispherx's defamation claim is separate from the merits of that claim. See Mitchell, 472 U.S. at 528 ("a question of immunity is separate from the merits of the underlying action"). Whether Enright's remarks to Shareholder A were "preliminary to" a proposed judicial proceeding and had "some relation" to that proceeding are different questions from whether Enright's remarks were false, malicious, defamatory or damaging. There may be some overlap, but it is minimal. Furthermore, involving as it does an issue of public policy that transcends the parties' individual concerns, the judicial proceedings privilege is sufficiently "important" to justify immediate appeal pursuant to the collateral order doctrine. See Digital Equip. Corp. v. Desktop Direct, Inc., 511 U.S. 863, 878 (1994) (emphasizing that right at stake must be "important" in order to trigger right to immediate appeal of prejudgment order). Third, the trial court's denial of appellants' absolute immunity claim is effectively unreviewable on appeal from a final judgment, because by then the purported "entitlement not to stand trial or face the other burdens of litigation" would be lost irretrievably. Mitchell, 472 U.S. at 526. "A fully litigated case can no more be untried than the law's proverbial bell can be unrung," as the Supreme Court said in Digital Equipment Corporation. See 511 U.S. at 872.
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