Former University of Alabama basketball player Kai Spears won his defamation lawsuit against the New York Times. Multiple published reports, including the Times, says a jury awarded the walk on athlete of over $9 million dollars following a trial in the aftermath of the murder of a Birmingham woman.
The 2023 death of Jamea Harris took place in Tuscaloosa near The University of Alabama campus. Student basketball player Darius Miles was charged in the murder. The Times reported that Spears was connected to the crime. The paper wrote that the athlete was a passenger of teammate Brandon Miller that present during the shooting. An unidentified source told the Times Spears was in the car which allegedly carried the weapon used in the killing. The paper retracted the claim and corrected its report.
Spears sued the Times in May of 2023 for defamation and invasion of privacy for the account, which was proven to be false. The person in Miller’s car was later proven to be Alabama student basketball manager Cooper Lee.
This is reportedly the first time in fifty years that the New York Times has lost a defamation case. The paper helped etch the legal precedent of “’actual malice with the U.S. Supreme court Sullivan versus the New York Times in 1964,
In the original suit, Montgomery Commissioner of Public Safety LB Sullivan sued the paper for defaming him in a civil rights based advertisement. The nation’s highest court established with its ruling that public figures don’t have the same protection from defamation as regular citizens. However, the SCOTUS decision also established “actual malice” where news publishers can be sued if they knowingly lie.
Reporters' phone calls to the New York Times and Kai Spears have gone unanswered.
