So I used to get people threatening to sue me on a fairly regular basis, two or three times a year, over stuff I’d said on the Charley Project. Basically if people (often the abductors or suspected abductors in family abduction cases) didn’t like what I had to say they would write to me with some empty, often poorly spelled threat about taking me to court for “libel” or “slander” or “defamation”.
Eventually the threats pretty much petered out. Not sure why. But then I got two in the past month. Zounds. Both were pretty laughable even by my standards.
One person who wrote to me said their relative who was listed as a runaway was, in fact, missing as a result of foul play, and they demanded I stop libeling their relative immediately and change my information or they’d sue. I think they were using a speech-to-text thing and perhaps were very emotional at the time because it didn’t make a lot of sense what they were saying. And what they forgot to do is tell me their relative’s full name. I wrote back telling them that threatening me was no way to start this out, and if they cared to start over and tell me what was going on, starting with the girl’s name, I would be willing to work with them.
Never heard back.
And then yesterday I got an email from someone who didn’t identify themselves, though I can make a guess or two at who might have written it. The person referenced a case where a man had been charged with murdering a missing girl, but he had been acquitted. They claimed what I had written was “wrong and not even accurate” and that they would sue me for “deformation” if “these type of false allegations continue to be typed” because what I had written could cause someone to physically attack the suspect.
Okay, whatever. I wonder if they’re also going to contact all the newspapers that have covered the case and the trial.
I’ve never libeled anyone. I’ve DEFINITELY never “deformed” anyone.
The Charley Project Blog 