JUST IN: Judge Sanctions Fox News For Withholding Evidence in Defamation Case
AP Photo/Ted Shaffrey, File
Fox News received a sanction on Wednesday from Delaware Superior Court Judge Eric Davis for withholding evidence in the $1.6 billion Dominion Voting Systems defamation suit.
Fox News’s lawyers received a lashing from Davis on Wednesday in the $1.6 billion Dominion Voting Systems defamation suit, as Davis said he would appoint a special master to investigate whether or not Fox’s legal team withheld evidence.
“I am very concerned… that there have been misrepresentations to the court. This is very serious,” Davis said Wednesday at a pretrial hearing, according to CNN.
The New York Times reported the withheld “evidence included recordings of the Fox News host Maria Bartiromo talking with former President Donald J. Trump’s lawyers, Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani, which Dominion said had been turned over only a week ago.”
Davis ruled that Dominion would now be allowed to make additional depositions and that “Fox will do everything they can to make the person available, and it will be at a cost to Fox.”
Davis added that the special master would investigate “Fox’s handling of discovery of documents and the question of whether Fox had inappropriately withheld details about Rupert Murdoch’s role as a corporate officer of Fox News,” added the Times.
Murdoch’s role at Fox News became a sticking point earlier in the week as the court sought clarification. Murdoch is widely known as the chairman of Fox News’s parent company Fox Corp, but on Sunday Fox’s lawyers disclosed to Dominion’s lawyers he also is “executive chair” at Fox News – a move which angered Davis.
“Rupert Murdoch has been listed as executive chairman of FOX News in our SEC filings since 2019 and this filing was referenced by Dominion’s own attorney during his deposition,” Fox said in a statement defending the timeline.
The Dominion lawsuit has pulled back the curtain on the inner workings of Fox News, particularly focused on the 2020 presidential election and internal discussions among hosts and executives denouncing former President Donald Trump’s election fraud allegations, which were given a platform on-air.
“Executives at all levels of Fox — both (Fox News Network) and (Fox Corporation) — knowingly opened Fox’s airwaves to false conspiracy theories about Dominion,” Dominion wrote in a recently unsealed filing. A five-week trial is currently scheduled to begin on April 17.
Fox News continues to fight the lawsuit in court and has claimed, “These documents once again demonstrate Dominion’s continued reliance on cherry-picked quotes without context to generate headlines in order to distract from the facts of this case. The foundational right to a free press is at stake and we will continue to fiercely advocate for the First Amendment in protecting the role of news organizations to cover the news.”
