Panel Read Broadcast Script Containing False Information... Supreme Court: "No Liability for Damages"

The Supreme Court has ruled that even if a commentator appearing as a panelist on a broadcast makes a false statement, the panelist is not liable for defamation damages if the remark was based on a script prepared by the broadcasting company.

The Second Division of the Supreme Court (Presiding Justice Oh Kyungmi) recently reversed the lower court ruling that had dismissed a damages claim filed by a person identified as Mr. Na against Choi Jinbong, a professor at Sungkonghoe University, and remanded the case to the Seoul Central District Court, Yonhap News reported on the 14th.

Exterior view of the Supreme Court. Yonhap News

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In January 2020, Professor Choi appeared as a panelist on the current affairs debate segment of YTN's "News Night" and commented on Mr. Na, who had been appointed as a member of the Liberty Korea Party's "Pledge Development Red Team" and then dismissed after three days. Two days before the broadcast, an image of a tweet that appeared to have been written by Mr. Na, stating "I want to join the Liberty Korea Party and cause trouble," was posted on an online community. Referring to this, Professor Choi said, "It is known that he has made such remarks," and "Isn't this something you can tell just by looking at this person's social media?" However, it was later revealed that the tweet image had been fabricated by someone who had impersonated Mr. Na, and around that time the media also reported that the image was fake.

Mr. Na filed a lawsuit seeking 30 million won in damages, claiming that Professor Choi's remarks caused him mental suffering. In response, Professor Choi argued that he was neither a reporter nor the producer responsible for the program, and that he had merely repeated, verbatim, the part of the script prepared by the broadcaster that the anchor was supposed to read.

The courts of first and second instance held that Professor Choi must pay 5 million won in damages to Mr. Na.

The court of first instance stated, "At the time of the broadcast, posts had already been uploaded indicating that the image was fabricated, and some media outlets had reported that it was fake," adding, "There is also no material to suggest that, prior to making the remark, the defendant asked the plaintiff whether he had written the post in question or investigated and verified its authenticity." The appellate court, noting in particular that Professor Choi is a professor in the Department of Journalism and Broadcasting, explained, "Even if he merely repeated a script prepared by a reporter or others, he cannot be exempted from liability for damages for the mental suffering inflicted on the plaintiff by his remarks."

The Supreme Court, however, found that there was room to exclude unlawfulness, on the grounds that Professor Choi did not categorically state that "Mr. Na himself wrote the tweet" and that his remarks were based on a script prepared by the broadcaster. The Court added, "The remarks in question were made on the basis of a script that YTN had prepared in advance, in the course of answering the host's questions as a panelist," and continued, "It is difficult to expect the defendant, who was merely a panelist and not the reporting entity, to distrust content prepared by a professional broadcaster and independently verify the facts."

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