More details to this question:
I filed a civil harassment restraining order against my neighbor and won the restraining order to go into effect for 3 years. My neighbor than turned around a served me with a retalitory temporary restraining order. Court date for me to appear is not for 3 more weeks, but my neighbor has gone around town and posted copies of this TRO around my community. The TRO is filled with lies that could be harmful to my reputation until proven innocent. Is it legal for my neighbor to publically post this restraining order without it being cause for deformation of character, etc ?
1 ANSWER
A temporary restraining order is a public document, and therefore can be disseminated to the public. Statements made in the course of a litigation, such as in an affidavit in support of an application for a TRO, are (in the jurisdictions in which I practice, but I"m not 100% sure about California) privileged, that is they can't be the basis of a defamation action, unless they are COMPLETELY irrelevant to the litigation. What you can do (although I'm not recommending that you escalate this dispute) is to post your own rebuttal to the claims your neighbor has made.
Answered on Apr 21st, 2014 at 3:08 PM