PDA

View Full Version : GI Sues Michael Moore for $85 Million


egarrard
05-31-2006, 06:18 PM
http://newsmax.com/archives/ic/2006/5/31/130505.shtml?s=ic
A double-amputee veteran of the Iraq war is suing filmmaker Michael Moore for $85 million, claiming Moore used an old interview with the G.I. to make him appear anti-war in his movie "Fahrenheit 9/11."

Sgt. Peter Damon, 33, who strongly supports America's invasion of Iraq, said he never agreed to be in the 2004 movie. Damon lost his arms when a Black Hawk helicopter exploded in front of him.

In the 2003 interview, which he did at Walter Reed Army Hospital for NBC News, he discussed only a new painkiller the military was using on wounded veterans, the New York Post reports.

"They took the clip because it was a gut-wrenching scene," Damon said. "They sandwiched it in. [Moore] was using me as ammunition."

According to the lawsuit filed in Suffolk County, Mass., Damon seems to "voice a complaint about the war effort" in the movie.

But he told the Post: "I was complaining about the pain I would've been having [if it weren't for the painkiller].”
Newsman Brian Williams ends the NBC clip by adding, "These men with catastrophic wounds are . . . completely behind the war effort," according to the lawsuit. That part wasn't shown in the Moore movie.

Damon’s lawyer Dennis Lynch said he delayed filing the lawsuit in a bid to settle the matter with Moore.

"We attempted to resolve the situation amicably with Mr. Moore [for a year] but he refused," he said.

Damon is asking for up to $75 million because of "loss of reputation, emotional distress, embarrassment, and personal humiliation."
Even lying for what you see as a good cause is still lying. Truth is the better path, whatever the consequences. :Thumb

Drizzt
06-01-2006, 07:48 AM
Isn't this something that is always happening in the media? There are a lot of unscrupuous reporters out there that will discuss things with you in one context, but when you read the newspaper or see the story broadcast the context is totally different from what you expected. This is a given and one of the main reasons one should never do interviews.

I wonder if Sgt. Damon was paid for that interview :shifty Common practice with interviews like this is to get a signed release from the person getting interviewed. If a release was signed I can't see this case getting anywhere because that release gives the interviewer the right to use that interview any way (s)he wants. If he didn't sign a release, Moore just might be in for a big legal bill.:devil

KaNaDiAnIcEmAn
06-01-2006, 08:02 AM
i am prety sure that a documentary made on such a thing would have written permission from whoever was in the film.

Even so, if you had a big camera in front of you and you were talking about whatever, would that not be kind of a hint that you were alright with it?

egarrard
06-01-2006, 04:12 PM
If a release was signedThat will be the issue in court.