Circuit Watcher

07-1365 Damon v. Moore
Before Torruella and Howard, Circuit Judges, and Delgado-Colón,¹ District Judge.
DELGADO-COLÓN, District Judge. Plaintiff-appellant, Sergeant Peter J. Damon (“Damon”), a former Sergeant in the Army Reserves, appeals from the dismissal of his defamation claim stemming from the non-consensual use of an interview he conducted for NBC Nightly News (“NBC”) in the documentary “Fahrenheit 9/11” (“documentary”). According to Damon, defendants-appellees (“Appellees”), and more specifically, Michael Moore (“Moore”), the creator, writer, director, producer and narrator of the documentary, portrayed Damon as supporting the documentary’s anti-war and anti-Commander-in-Chief message by using and placing in the documentary, without his consent, a sixteen-second segment of an interview he previously conducted with NBC. In dismissing the defamation claim, the district court found that Damon’s appearance in the documentary was not reasonably susceptible of a defamatory meaning/interpretation. For the following reasons, we affirm the dismissal.² … Damon v. Moore.

1. Of the District of Puerto Rico, sitting by designation. [↩]
2. While the complaint contained, and the District Court dismissed, numerous other causes of action, the only issue before us is the dismissal of Damon’s defamation claim. [↩]