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St. Louis Public Radio Argues It Can’t Be Sued for Defamation

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At a hearing yesterday in a lawsuit brought by the former general manager of St. Louis Public Radio, an attorney representing the station put forth a surprising defense: that the local NPR affiliate is unique among the major news outlets in town in that it can’t be sued for defamation.

Tim Eby’s lawsuit is against the University of Missouri Board of Curators, which operates the radio station. He alleges that the station published false statements about him, including that he “chose to uphold white supremacy” and mismanaged the station’s finances. But the attorney for the university, Joseph Martineau, argued that Eby’s suit must be dismissed because the sovereign immunity enjoyed by the state of Missouri extends down to St. Louis Public Radio.

Sovereign immunity is a legal concept that provides government entities broad protections from civil litigation, not unlike the concept of qualified immunity which makes suing police officers for their misconduct so difficult.

When asked after the hearing if it created a moral hazard to have a media operation immune from suits of libel, slander, and defamation, Martineau replied, “No comment.”

Although such lawsuits, and the mere specter of them, can be the bane of a journalist’s existence, recent legal action such as the successful Dominion Voting Systems suit against Fox News and a Kentucky high schooler’s suit against CNN have shown the critical — if annoying — role such litigation serves for people who have been legitimately smeared.

But Tina Pamintuan, St. Louis Public Radio’s CEO (and Eby’s replacement), said the public need not worry. “I am 100 percent confident in the journalism that is produced at STLPR. Our reporters are highly trained professionals who take a lot of care in their work. 

“STLPR exists to uplift its community and this region through fair, rigorous, fact-based news and information. That is our focus and it’s important that we continue to keep that in mind. Like all nonprofit media, we have limited resources that are put to best use by prioritizing our mission.”

(The station also made clear they have adopted NPR’s Ethics Handbook in addition to their own editorial standards.)

St. Louis Circuit Court Judge Joseph Patrick Whyte is weighing the station’s motion to dismiss on those sovereign immunity grounds.

Yesterday’s hearing before Whyte was the first hearing in the lawsuit Eby filed last August. Eby had been the local station’s general manager for 11 years until he resigned in September 2020.

A month prior to Eby’s removal, a group of station staffers published a blog post accusing him of choosing “to uphold white supremacy at the station.” Eby’s lawsuit cites a story published on the radio station’s website linking to and quoting that blog post. The suit also cites another story, published roughly a year later announcing the hiring of the new CEO, Pamintuan, which refers to Eby having resigned “amid accusations from newsroom staff that he ignored problems of systemic racism at the station and mismanaged finances.”

Eby’s attorney Christian Montroy has written in court filings that the station had ample reason to know those claims about Eby were false. He cites initiatives and task forces around diversity implemented at the station under Eby’s tenure, as well as a grant the station received from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to boost the diversity of its news coverage, audiences, and staff.

Now, Montroy is perplexed at the idea that the media operation is immune from the same sort of lawsuits that its peers like the Post-Dispatch and even the Riverfront Times are subject to.

“They are representing themselves as state-controlled media,” says Montroy. “And so they are trying to argue that as an arm of the state they can call anyone a white supremacist or even a pedophile” and not be subject to litigation. He cites the station’s own Statement of Editorial Integrity as evidence it maintains “editorial independence” from the board of curators.

Montroy says that even though the station is operated by the University of Missouri-St. Louis, St. Louis Public Radio itself is a “proprietary function,” a legal term meaning that the station’s purpose is a nongovernmental one. In arguments, he specifically referenced the quiz show Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me, saying that it is “ridiculous” that airing such a program is a function of the government in the manner of educating students at a state university.

He also argues that the radio station carried $3 million of liability insurance covering its content. The existence of an insurance policy could potentially waive sovereign immunity protections. It also raises the question of why the station needed insurance if they were immune from lawsuits to begin with.

Eby’s lawsuit is now playing out against the backdrop of a wider controversy surrounding the national NPR organization, touched off last week when longtime senior business editor Uri Berliner penned an essay accusing his employer of representing a “distilled worldview of a very small segment of the U.S. population.”

In his essay and subsequent interviews, he has cited as examples of this worldview a multitude of editorial practices within the organization, including having reporters record all of their sources’ race and gender information as well as an in-house style in which is it verboten to use the term terrorists to refer to the Hamas militants who murdered 1,200 Israelis, including children, the elderly and music festival revelers, on October 7. 

Berliner has since resigned. 

After yesterday’s hearing, both sides await Judge Whyte’s ruling on the Board of Curator’s motion to dismiss. Court filings indicate a jury trial in the matter is set for July, though that will almost certainly get pushed back, if the matter goes to trial at all.

We welcome tips and feedback. Email the author at [email protected] or follow on Twitter at @RyanWKrull. Subscribe to Riverfront Times newsletters.Follow us: Apple News |  Google News | NewsBreak | Reddit | Instagram | Facebook | Twitter | Or sign up for our RSS Feed

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Fenton Man Charged in Sword Attack on Roommate

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A warrant is out for a Fenton man’s arrest after he allegedly attacked his roommate with a sword. 

Police say that on Sunday, Angelus Scott spoke openly about “slicing his roommate’s head” before he grabbed a sword, raised it up and then swung it down at the roommate. 

The roommate grabbed Scott’s hand in time to prevent injury. When police arrived at the scene, they found the weapon used in the assault. 

The sword in question was a katana, which is a Japanese sword recognizable for its curved blade. 

This isn’t the first time a samurai-style sword has been used to violent effect in St. Louis. In 2018, a man hearing voices slaughtered his ex-boyfriend with a samurai sword. His mother said he suffered from schizoaffective disorder.

As for Scott, 35, the St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office was charged yesterday with two felonies, assault first degree and armed criminal action. The warrant for his arrest says he is to be held on $200,000 bond.

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Caught on Video, Sheriff Says He’s Ready to ‘Turn It All Over’ to Deputy

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Video of St. Louis Sheriff Vernon Betts taken by a former deputy suggests that the sheriff has a successor in mind to hand the reins of the department over to, even as Betts is in an increasingly heated campaign for reelection. 

“I ain’t here for all this rigmarole,” Betts says in the video while seated behind his desk at the Carnahan Courthouse. “The Lord sent me here to turn this department around and I’m doing the best I can and I think I’ve done a good job. I’ve got about eight months and I’m going to qualify for my fourth pension.”

He goes on, “Right now I can walk up out of here and live happily ever after and forget about all this…and live like a king.”

The sheriff then says his wife has been in Atlanta looking at houses and that the other deputy in the room, Donald Hawkins, is someone Betts has been training “to turn it all over to him.”

Asked about the video, Betts tells the RFT, “My future plans are to win reelection on August 6th by a wide margin and to continue my mission as the top elected law enforcement official to make St. Louis safer and stronger. Serving the people of St. Louis with integrity, honor and professional law enforcement qualifications is a sacred responsibility, and I intend to complete that mission.”

The video of Betts was taken by Barbara Chavers, who retired from the sheriff’s office in 2016 after 24 years of service. Chavers now works security at Schnucks at Grand and Gravois. Betts’ brother Howard works security there, too.

Chavers tells the RFT that she was summoned to Betts’ office last week after Betts’ brother made the sheriff aware that she was supporting Montgomery. It was no secret: Chavers had filmed a Facebook live video in which she said she was supporting Betts’ opponent Alfred Montgomery in the election this fall. “Make the judges safe,” she says in the video, standing in front of a large Montgomery sign on Gravois Avenue. “They need a sheriff who is going to make their courtrooms safe.”

In his office, even as Chavers made clear she was filming him, Betts told Chavers he was “flabbergasted” and “stunned” she was supporting Montgomery. 

“I don’t know what I did that would make you go against the preacher man,” he says, referring to himself. He then refers to Montgomery as “ungodly.” 

Betts goes on to say that not long ago, he was walking in his neighborhood on St. Louis Avenue near 20th Street when suddenly Montgomery pulled up in his car and, according to Betts, shouted, “You motherfucker, you this, you that. You’re taking my signs down.”

Montgomery tells the RFT that he’s never interacted with Betts outside of candidate forums and neighborhood meetings. 

“I don’t think anyone with good sense would do something like that to a sitting sheriff,” Montgomery says.

Montgomery has had campaign signs missing and on at least two occasions has obtained video of people tearing them down. (Chavers notes that the sign that she filmed her original Facebook video in front of is itself now missing.)

One man who lives near Columbus Square says that he recently put out two Montgomery signs, which later went missing. “If they keep taking them, I’ll keep putting them up,” he said. 

Betts says he has nothing to do with the missing signs. In the video Chavers filmed in Betts’ office, Betts says that his campaign isn’t in a spot where it needs to resort to tearing down opponents’ signs.

“If you sit here long enough, a man is getting ready to come across the street from City Hall bringing me $500, today,” Betts says. “I’m getting that kind of support. I don’t need to tear down signs.”

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St. Louis to Develop First Citywide Transportation Plan in Decades

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The City of St. Louis is working to develop its first citywide mobility plan in decades, Mayor Tishaura Jones’ office announced Tuesday. This plan seeks to make it easier for everyone — drivers, pedestrians, bikers and public transit users — to safely commute within the city.

The plan will bring together other city projects like the Brickline Greenway, Future64, the MetroLink Green Line, and more, “while establishing new priorities for a safer, more efficient and better-maintained transportation network across the City,” according to the release. 

The key elements in the plan will be public engagement, the development of a safety action plan, future infrastructure priorities and transportation network mapping, according to Jones’ office.

The overarching goals are to create a vision for citywide mobility, plan a mixture of short and long-term mobility projects and to develop improved communication tools with the public to receive transportation updates. In recent years, both people who use public transit and cyclists have been outspoken about the difficulties — and dangers — of navigating St. Louis streets, citing both cuts to public transit and traffic violence.

To garner public input and participation for the plan, Jones’ office said there will be community meetings, focus groups and a survey for residents to share their concerns. The city will also be establishing a Community Advisory Committee. Those interested in learning more should check out at tmp-stl.com/

“Everyone deserves to feel safe when getting around St. Louis, whether they’re driving, biking, walking or taking public transit,” Jones said in a news release. “Creating a comprehensive transportation and mobility plan allows us to make intentional and strategic investments so that moving around St. Louis for jobs, education, and entertainment becomes easier, safer and more enjoyable.”

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