Yelp Doesn’t Have to Take Down Libelous Post About Lawyer, Supreme Court Rules
The U.S. Supreme Court rejected a San Francisco attorney’s request Tuesday to order Yelp to take down an online denunciation by a former client, leaving intact a California Supreme Court ruling that said the online review company can’t be ordered to remove libelous or offensive content, the San Francisco Chronicle reports.
At the trial level, a judge had found the client’s attack on San Francisco attorney Dawn Hassell to be libelous and ordered Yelp to remove it. Later the state’s high court found that the removal order conflicted with a federal law that shields internet service providers from legal responsibility for statements posted by others, writes the Chronicle‘s Bob Egelko.
The suit resulted from a one-star review on Yelp that described the plaintiff’s firm as incompetent and advising others to avoid it.
Read the SF Chronicle article.
