Somerville Scout briefly covers Jonmon-DSLJ lawsuit, gets it *almost* right

[ron_newman]

The current issue of Somerville Scout, which is hitting a lot of snail-mailboxes today, has this short item on page 7, under the heading W&L: WINNERS

JOHN DOE

A crew of citizen journalists, including "100 John and Jane Does" from Davis Square's LiveJournal, deserves props for fighting a $5.5 million libel lawsuit filed by Jonathan Graves Monsarrat who was upset by the message board's comments about his 2010 arrest involving underage teens. Fortunately, the case was dropped without prejudice.

Actually, it was dismissed with prejudice, meaning it can't be filed again. I used this form to ask Scout to correct the item before they put it online.

Comments

[contradictacat.livejournal.com]

I know this equine has been well and thoroughly pummeled, but seriously...I can't help but love how Jonmon's attempt to "clear his 'good' name" has only dragged it further and further down over a wider and wider area. Now ALL of Somerville (at least, that part that reads The Scout) will know of him and his misdeeds!

Also, the "the case was dropped...." bit is unclear. Is it referring to the charges, or the lawsuit he brought?

[ron_newman]

The "charges" and the "lawsuit" are the same thing. The whole thing was dismissed with prejudice, by request of the plaintiff.

ETA: Oh, I see what you're saying now. The charges against Jonmon three years ago were also dropped -- whether or not with prejudice, I don't know.

[intuition-ist.livejournal.com]

at the very least, they're guilty of sloppy editing... yeah, i know - *gasp* *the horror*

[achinhibitor.livejournal.com]

It's likely they don't know the exact meaning of "without prejudice" and they think it's better than "with prejudice".

[duffless2323.livejournal.com]

I can't find it on the web and don't get the scout anymore, if anyone can scan and post- or link it that would be great.

[ron_newman]

What I posted here is the entire item. It's just part of a 'Winners and Losers' column. It won't be on the web for a few more weeks, according to the editor.

(I thought Scout was automatically delivered to every residential address in the city.)

[duffless2323.livejournal.com]

Ahh, sorry I didn't understand. I moved to Arlington, but Jonmon already knows that. ;-)