After the plaintiff and defendant exchanged several profanity-laced emails, a Texas lawyer has decided to dismiss his $100 million defamation suit against an online critic who allegedly called him a “Nazi” and “white supremacist” in internet postings and caused the attorney to lose his job at a law firm.

Attorney Jason Van Dyke filed the defamation case against Thomas Retzlaff in a state district court earlier this year. But Retzlaff later removed the suit to federal court and moved to dismiss it under the Texas Citizens Participation Act, an anti-SLAPP law passed by the Texas Legislature in 2011 that allows judges to quickly dismiss cases that infringe on free-speech rights, and forces a plaintiff to pay the defendant’s court costs.

This content has been archived. It is available through our partners, LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law.

To view this content, please continue to their sites.

Not a Lexis Subscriber?
Subscribe Now

Not a Bloomberg Law Subscriber?
Subscribe Now

Why am I seeing this?

LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law are third party online distributors of the broad collection of current and archived versions of ALM's legal news publications. LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law customers are able to access and use ALM's content, including content from the National Law Journal, The American Lawyer, Legaltech News, The New York Law Journal, and Corporate Counsel, as well as other sources of legal information.

For questions call 1-877-256-2472 or contact us at [email protected]