Page 21 - Gawker Teaching Note
P. 21
Judge -V- Jury
Initially, the judge had agreed with Gawker that the
Hogan tape was newsworthy thereby maintaining, as they
had in the past, their refusal to second-guess
newspapers’ decisions about what and whom was news
in the public interest. Gawker’s editors were treated by
the federal judge as if they were running a newspaper.
However, the jury in state court did the opposite. Gawker
had to persuade ordinary people that some legitimate
purpose was served by this exercise in public humiliation.
