$50 million lawsuit: Eric Bolling vs. Yashar Ali over Fox News host sexting scandal

Originally published at: http://boingboing.net/2017/08/09/eric-bolling-v-yashar.html

Pics, or it didn’t happen?

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I feel like there are some crucial differences between this and the Gawker/Hogan suit, like how it was a published video in that case, vs how thank god we don’t have the picture reported in this case.

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Damn! Beat me to it. Stupid job :frowning:

I’m full up for my yearly quota of things I can never unsee.

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I tend to agree. People sued reporters for defamation long before the Gawker case, just follow most of what ends up on Popehat.

That being said, this sort of asshat-ery, Gawker or not, shows how important journalistic protections are in the first place. The legal system shouldn’t be a club to silence reporters, especially when these sources are party to the events that transpired.

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The Fourth Estate is the canary in the coal mine.

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Welcome to my world.

:slight_smile:

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Oh absolutely. Suing a reporter with the backing of a fairly high-profile news organization like this feels like it would be mostly for show, to silence future stories from less well-secure reporters.

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Will this be the first major lawsuit to be decided not in a courtroom nor in a settlement, but on Twitter?

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Is Ali in a State with SLAPP laws?

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I still don’t understand this tactic. Does is ever work? 1 time out of 100? I mean, it sounds like a pretty shit/stupid method where not only do you creep out 99%+ of the people, but now they got compromising pics of you.

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Do you mean the unsolicited pics or the lawsuit?

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Er the pics. I am just amazed how prevalent this is.

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How can this dickhead imagine he’ll be successful? Surely all it takes to shut down his bullshit fake outrage is for one of these dick pick recipients to whip out their phone. AFAIK it’s non-trivial to fake a MMS.

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Despite Thiel’s utter nastiness, I have much more understanding for the Gawker/Hogan lawsuit – publishing someone else’s sex tape without permission should entail severe penalties. Gawker is (was?) gross.

This is… much more disturbing. And to think I’m contrasting that statement with a Hulk Hogan sex tape…

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I’m sure certain… analytic techniques could be applied, to compare the, uh, photo with the, uhm, real thing…

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“…all of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity … because they have confidentiality agreements with Fox News and its parent company 21st Century Fox.”

Serious question for the lawyers. Do we have any lawyers?

Anyway - why would that extend to private, non business related photos or texts? Or did he post this WITH work relate d materials.

“We need to confirm numbers for the 4th quarter and cross reference the Department of Energy quotes before you look at my peen (attached).”

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A dozen sources is impressive, but if they remain anonymous it won’t help Ali in court. You only need a couple of them to testify and then Bolling’s defense will resort to questioning the definition of “unsolicited” (and perhaps the definition “penis” too.)

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Bolling’s lawyers constructing a legal argument along the lines of “couldn’t have happened - this man has no penis” does have a certain appeal.

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Well, that’s what I heard!

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