Blogs

First Amendment arguments get short shrift from judge in Guardian v. Weekly lawsuit

By Andy Van De Voorde

Apparently unsatisfied with a $15.6 million jury verdict in its predatory pricing lawsuit against SF Weekly, the Bay Guardian Friday asked a judge to give it even more.

During a post-trial hearing, Guardian attorney Ralph C. Alldredge told Superior Court Judge Marla J. Miller that his client wanted the entire $6.4 million verdict trebled rather than only the portion of the damages incurred within one year of the filing of the complaint.

The effect would have been to turn a $15.6 million verdict into a $19.2 million verdict.

More

As expected, Guardian boss wallows in his trial-court victory.

By Andy Van De Voorde

The dust has barely settled at Superior Court following the jury verdict last week in the Bay Guardian’s predatory pricing lawsuit against the Weekly.

But already Guardian boss Bruce Brugmann is doing what The Snitch expected him to do: Loudly encouraging others to use his successful (for now) shakedown effort as a model for other businesses to employ against their competitors.

Brugmann must be angling for a bronze statue down at the courthouse — or in Red Square.

In a story published Tuesday in the Boston Phoenix, Brugmann tells Phoenix media writer Adam Reilly precisely how he wants to see his $15.6 million verdict against the Weekly and its parent company New Times (now Village Voice Media) interpreted.

“Everyone can use our suit as a model and template for any big chain that’s coming in and trying to predatory-price them,” said Brugmann.

Golly.

Creating a “model and a template” for a flood of anticompetitive litigation that will inevitably lead to fewer newspapers and higher prices for the mom ‘n’ pop business owners who buy most of the ads in alternative weeklies.

Such a legacy to leave for a self-professed defender of the little guy.

More

Guardian hits jackpot—but don’t count the money yet, Bruce.

By Andy Van De Voorde

The Bay Guardian hit the lawsuit lottery for the second time in its history Wednesday, winning a $15.6 million judgment against SF Weekly and its parent company, New Times (now Village Voice Media) and it’s former sister paper the East Bay Express. The jury awarded the Guardian $1.79 million for damages from Oct. 2001 to Oct. 2003, and $4.6 million for damages from Oct. of 2003 to present, but that second amount could be trebled.

Village Voice Media vows that Guardian publisher Bruce Brugmann will have a difficult time cashing his ticket.

The verdict came despite the fact that the Guardian produced no direct evidence of a predatory pricing conspiracy aimed at harming the Guardian and called not a single advertiser to the stand to testify on its behalf.

More

The Snitch packs his things and leaves the courthouse.

By Andy Van De Voorde

It was a packed house Wednesday at Superior Court when the jury announced its verdict in the Bay Guardian’s predatory-pricing lawsuit against the Weekly.

The Snitch had been lurking around the courthouse for the past four days when word came down from an informant there would be a jury verdict at noon.

That was actually delayed slightly when the court reporter, whose inability to keep up with witnesses as they testified had become legendary, decided she needed a break after working on another trial during the morning.

As a result, there were 15 minutes during which the owners of both the Weekly and the Guardian waited together in the courtroom, sitting in the gallery.

The minutes passed painfully as the second hand on the courtroom clock plodded its way around the orb.

As time slowly dragged on, increasing numbers of Guardian employees and hangers-on filed in.

The Snitch had anticipated more of the snickering and chortling that he had heard so much of during the trial.

Instead, Bruce Brugmann, Tim Redmond, Guardian co-publisher Jean Dibble, and controller Sandy Lange, among assorted other hangers-on, watched quietly as the jury foreman handed them their early Christmas gift: damages in the amount of more than $15 million.

According to evidence presented at trial, that figure is far more than the Guardian has earned throughout its history.

The panel voted 11 to 1 that the Weekly, its former sister paper the East Bay Express, and their parent company, New Times (now Village Voice Media) intended to injure the Guardian and had done so.

When The Snitch heard the verdict, he was disappointed but not surprised.

More

Today's verdict in Bruce Brugmann's suit was an expensive lesson in laws, lawyers, and lawsuits, and how one man's obsession manipulated the system.

Like Ralph Nader, Bruce Brugmann is out of touch with reality. Feigning obliviousness to the Internet, the dot-com bust, 9/11, the Bush economy — and the $330 million lost by the San Francisco Chronicle to these very factors — Brugmann insisted in court that only SF Weekly threatened his wallet.

Jurors agreed and hit Village Voice Media with more than $15.6 million in damages. Brugmann thus earned in court more than he ever earned in 40 years of publishing.

More

Another day and still no verdict in Guardian v. Weekly tilt.

By Andy Van De Voorde

It was another uneventful day Tuesday in the Bay Guardian's predatory pricing lawsuit against the Weekly.

The jury wrapped up its third full day of deliberations at the courthouse on McAllister Street without rendering a verdict.

Though the panel has sent out notes in past days, nary a peep was heard on Tuesday, leading attorneys on both sides to speculate about the possible significance of the silent treatment.

More

Plus: The Chronicle Awakens!

By Andy Van De Voorde

It was a long weekend down at the courthouse bureau, where The Snitch whiled away the hours playing Nerf basketball, reading the papers and generally trying to kill time as he awaited a verdict in the Bay Guardian’s predatory pricing lawsuit against the SF Weekly.

The hours move slowly when contemplating the fact that you’ve been sued under a Depression-era “below cost pricing” law that requires a remarkably low burden of proof from plaintiffs—and the fact that in this case the plaintiff did everything but cry on the stand in an attempt to play the hometown victim for a jury whose members had admitted in large numbers pre-trial that they didn’t much like “big media.”

(That verdict still hasn’t come, by the way—the jury opted to knock off at 1:30 p.m. Monday without rendering a decision.)

The tedium was broken, though, when your faithful correspondent saw that the San Francisco Chronicle had finally deigned to weigh in on the case.

More

Jury still out in Guardian v. Weekly suit

By Andy Van De Voorde

After deliberating for five hours Friday, the jury in the Bay Guardian's predatory pricing lawsuit against the Weekly knocked off without a verdict. The panel will take the weekend off and will take up the case against Monday morning at 8:30 at the courthouse on McAllister Street.

Under the law, the Guardian needs nine votes from the twelve-member panel to win a verdict. The Weekly needs nine to receive a verdict in favor of the defense. Anything in between represents a hung jury, meaning the Guardian would not win, but could in theory ask the judge to allow it to refile the case.

The Snitch survives courthouse encounter, awaits further thrashing.

By Andy Van De Voorde

While covering the Guardian’s lawsuit against the Weekly, your faithful courthouse correspondent has noticed a pattern:

Though Bruce Brugmann’s paper enjoys slagging people in print — take, for instance, its hysterical 2005 stories blasting the Clear Channel concert promotion firm as “evil” because the company had the audacity to take its business to the Weekly — the publication gets a mite snippy when subjected to scrutiny itself.

More

Guardian’s closing ranges from the assassination of JFK to Alice in Wonderland.

By Andy Van De Voorde

In long-awaited closing arguments Thursday, the Bay Guardian told jurors in its predatory pricing case against the Weekly that it will go out of business if it doesn’t receive a favorable verdict.

“If this continues, it’s inevitable,” said Guardian attorney Ralph C. Alldredge, who referred to his client as “a shadow of the company it formerly was.”

The mild-mannered Alldredge began his argument by telling jurors not to expect “Obama-level eloquence.”

But if his argument lacked fire, it didn’t lack for melodrama.

More

As closing arguments near, The Snitch has time to ruminate.

By Andy Van De Voorde

As The Snitch was killing time at his one-desk courthouse bureau, tidying up the place while awaiting tomorrow's closing arguments in the Bay Guardian's predatory pricing lawsuit against the Weekly, he noticed that the Guardian was already speaking of the case in momentous tones.

Guardian executive editor Tim Redmond wrote Tuesday that the "outcome could impact the future of the alternative press," and claimed that alt-weekly publishers across the land were eagerly awaiting the verdict.

Golly.

This is a convenient fiction for the Guardian: The notion that it is leading some sort of communal crusade rather than simply trying to cash in by sinking its hand into what it repeatedly calls the "deep pockets" of Weekly parent company Village Voice Media (formerly New Times).

The Snitch hasn't heard of a single alt-weekly publisher who's tuned in to the trial, other than Brugmann pal Bill Johnson of Palo Alto Weekly fame, who sat through much of the case and then on Tuesday made his bed with the Guardian by calmly suggesting that predatory pricing schemes happen "all the time."

More

After five weeks, testimony concludes in anti-Weekly suit.

By Andy Van De Voorde

The last witness testified Tuesday in the Bay Guardian’s predatory pricing lawsuit against the Weekly, meaning the only thing left is closing arguments.

Those won’t come until Thursday, however, because Superior Court Judge Marla J. Miller is giving attorneys for both sides Wednesday off to prepare final exhibits for inspection by the jury.

As a result, the case should go to the jury late in the day Thursday, meaning a verdict conceivably may not be returned until next week.

More

Plus: Brugmann told student journos back in 1979, "You people are about the scum of the earth"

By Andy Van De Voorde

The Bay Guardian's predatory pricing lawsuit against the SF Weekly is on hold today as the attorneys haggle over jury instructions with Superior Court Judge Marla J. Miller, a break which left your McAllister bureau chief time to continue his pastime of perusing what others have written about the case.

For the first time on Monday an outsider weighed in — though one wonders if Editor & Publisher correspondent Mark Fitzgerald can be called an impartial observer, given that his story openly admits he is a personal friend of Bruce Brugmann's and not long ago was seen hoisting shots with the Brute in a South American cantina.

In a short story posted today, Fitzgerald draws a broad outline of the case not by studying the evidence but by remarking upon the blogs that have been posted by the Snitch and his ponytailed counterpart, Guardian executive editor Tim Redmond.

Those writings, said Fitzgerald, "recall the great newspaper feuds of yesteryear."

More

Plus: “Curse words” aimed at the Weekly

By Andy Van De Voorde

Under California law, attorneys are allowed to ask hypothetical questions of expert witnesses. But Bay Guardian attorney Ralph C. Alldredge outdid himself Friday when certified public accountant Everett P. Harry took the stand in the Guardian’s predatory pricing lawsuit against the Weekly.

Harry is the financial expert called by the Weekly to refute the outlandish damage estimates submitted by Clifford Kupperberg, the $500-per-hour Guardian witness who on Thursday discussed fourteen different “damage models” ranging from $4.4 million up to $11.8 million.

More

In its best year ever, the Guardian made a 5 percent profit. So how does its damages expert imagine a world in which the Guardian has a 75 percent profit margin?

By Andy Van De Voorde

As The Snitch was sipping his coffee and checking the morning line at Bay Meadows today, he took time to surf past the Bay Guardian’s Web site and check in on the competition.

Your faithful courthouse correspondent always likes to see how the Guardian is covering its predatory pricing lawsuit against the Weekly, in part because he appreciates the rhetorical dexterity necessary to cast a patina of logic onto a case that seems to spin further into the ether with each passing day.

As an aside, it would appear that Guardian publisher Bruce Brugmann checks up on the competition as well. On Thursday morning, the big brute was standing next to The Snitch waiting to go through the metal detector at the courthouse on McAllister Street when the two journalists (your Superior Court bureau chief uses the word loosely, of course) happened to arrive at the gate simultaneously.

Brugmann gestured, almost as if in a curtsy, to signal The Snitch through.

Thank you, said The Snitch, who while growing up in the witness protection program was always taught by his mother to be polite, especially to six-foot-five bullies capable of holding you upside down by the ankles and shaking free all the change in your pockets.

More