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Denver Publishing Co. v. Bueno9/16/2002
He lived a law abiding life, and was never involved in his siblings' criminal activities.
One can only imagine Eddie Bueno's reaction when he picked up the Rocky Mountain News on Sunday, August 28, 1994, to see the front page, one-inch, bold-print banner headline: "Denver's Biggest Crime Family." The smaller sub-headline read: "15 of 18 Bueno Siblings Have Arrest Records, Including 2 Known as Society Bandits." See Ann Carnahan, Denver's Biggest Crime Family, Rocky Mountain News, Aug. 28, 1994, at 1A. Inside the tabloid newspaper, the Bueno story took four full pages. See id. at 20A-24A. The first page of the article depicted a full-page Bueno family tree, featuring photographs of each of the siblings surrounding the parents' wedding picture. See id. at 20A. Front and center at the top of the tree, directly under the one-inch heading "Denver's Biggest Crime Family," was a photograph of Eddie himself, labeled simply as "EDDIE, 55, the oldest of the Bueno children." Id. The following thirteen-column article provided extensive detail of various criminal activity within the Bueno family, including over twenty-five statements and headings forming the basis of Bueno's lawsuit, among them: "Older Siblings Lure Younger Into Life of Crime." See id. at 22A.
Eddie Bueno sued the newspaper for defamation and for invading his privacy by portraying him in a false light as having the same criminal propensities as his siblings. At trial, the court granted the newspaper's directed verdict on Bueno's defamation claim but allowed the false light claim to go to the jury. The jury returned a verdict in favor of Bueno on the false light claim, awarding him $53,253.90 in economic and non-economic losses, as well as $53,253.00 in exemplary damages. The court of appeals affirmed. Today, the majority opinion invalidates this award by refusing to recognize the viability of false light invasion of privacy in Colorado.
II. Overlap Does Not Justify the Elimination of False Light
First, the court reasons that false light overlaps with defamation in both the interests protected and the conduct averted, and is therefore an unnecessary claim. See maj. op. at 3. Here, I do not agree that the best solution to overlapping torts is the wholesale elimination of one of the claims. The majority opinion begins its analysis by providing a lengthy comparison of the similarities and differences between false light and defamation, rightly finding that the two torts are not exact duplicates. See id. at 16-29. The majority concedes that scenarios exist "where false light arguably fits, but defamation fails," id. at 27, because while false light focuses on publications "highly offensive" to a reasonable person, defamation targets only publications that lower the plaintiff's reputation in the community. See id. at 23. Despite this imperfect fit between false light and defamation, the court nevertheless decides that the two torts are suff
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