Should Marshawn sue the Bellevue PD for slander?

I think he should and would chip in to make it happen. Its unreal what that think they can do to people. If they arent held accountable for this its basically "game on" with police PDs having no responsibility to actually make sure the truth is being reported.

What? Didn't they say they agreed with the Seahawks, it was bogus?

Well Im not sure slander would technically be the right term here, but w/o any charge made against Lynch, the PD publicly announced he was under investigation. Why did they need to release that info to the public w/o any evidence whatsoever? Terrible and irresponsible imo. That would be the equivalent of a chick screaming rape against you, and w/o any evidence the PD publicly announces they are investigating you being accused of rape. What would that do to your reputation? What would your friends and family say? That would be awful to go through, even if you are publicly cleared.

So while maybe not "slander" this was a classless and irresponsible move on Bellevue PDs fault imo.

Heres more info on it

http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/eye-on-foo ... -by-police

If anything he should sue the accuser for slander

MB12":3ubmpusx said:

If anything he should sue the accuser for slander

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You're probably right, there would be more legal precedent to sue the accuser. But I just feel like the PD should know better

Defamation of character is more along the lines I think for the PD, Slander and false allegations for the accuser.

Wasn't it confirmed, BPD made a statement because there were false rumors he had been arrested?

therealjohncarlson":2o4ojbwq said:

Well Im not sure slander would technically be the right term here, but w/o any charge made against Lynch, the PD publicly announced he was under investigation. Why did they need to release that info to the public w/o any evidence whatsoever? Terrible and irresponsible imo. That would be the equivalent of a chick screaming rape against you, and w/o any evidence the PD publicly announces they are investigating you being accused of rape. What would that do to your reputation? What would your friends and family say? That would be awful to go through, even if you are publicly cleared.

So while maybe not "slander" this was a classless and irresponsible move on Bellevue PDs fault imo.

Heres more info on it

http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/eye-on-foo ... -by-police

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Here's the BPD's response to why they released Lynch's name while the investigation was in process:

The release was sent out because of inaccurate information on Twitter and other social media sites that were making much worse allegations (that Lynch was arrested), as well as media requests for the disclosable information. We determined that the right course of action was to release the facts of the allegations, via a news release, to ensure that all media, as well as the public, received the most up to date, factual information at the same time.


http://blog.seattlepi.com/football/2014 ... awn-lynch/

I don't think it was irresponsible at all, although I would have contacted Mr. Lynch and ask him if he wanted them to release the information and let him or his attorney make that call.

So let me get this right.

The OP not only thinks the Bellevue police are guilty of slander for saying a report had been filed and they were looking into it, and culpable because the media reported an arrest that never happened, he is willing to help a millionaire sue them with his own money?

His heart is in the right place. Even if his head is somewhere else. What a hell of a fan-atic. I tip my cap.

therealjohncarlson":2qg8yf2k said:

I think he should and would chip in to make it happen. Its unreal what that think they can do to people. If they arent held accountable for this its basically "game on" with police PDs having no responsibility to actually make sure the truth is being reported.

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They did their job and reported there was an investigation. Not their fault, its on the person who reported it.

No offense but so tired of fans offering to "chip in" all the time. They wanted to "chip in" to help with marshawns media fines, too. He's a grown man who makes more money than most fans ever will. He doesn't need charity. Chip in to help homeless kids or abused animals or something. It was embarrassing enough last year when 12s wanted to pay his media day fines for him if he got any.

its also not slander for the police to issue a statement about an investigation of a prominent public figure, and even if it were lynch would have to prove damages. Considering lynchs history with a couple other issues and the lack of amy details whatsoever in this case along with the fact that he was cleared entirely within the week, it would be pretty hard to prove damages.

chris98251":ppks7684 said:

Defamation of character is more along the lines I think for the PD, Slander and false allegations for the accuser.

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Defamation is the blanket term for both slander and libel.

Police reports are public information.

BPD can be sued for nondisclosure.

BPD cannot be sued for disclosure.

This is literally the most asinine suggestion/post that I've ever seen on .NET. And that's saying something.

^^^^^
I don't think very many fans thought for even a second that #24 couldn't pay his own fines for the media crap.
I do think that the fans that offered to "chip in", I was one of them, felt that it was an easy way to show our support of his stance.

therealjohncarlson":2hsar7pd said:

Well Im not sure slander would technically be the right term here, but w/o any charge made against Lynch, the PD publicly announced he was under investigation. Why did they need to release that info to the public w/o any evidence whatsoever? Terrible and irresponsible imo. That would be the equivalent of a chick screaming rape against you, and w/o any evidence the PD publicly announces they are investigating you being accused of rape. What would that do to your reputation? What would your friends and family say? That would be awful to go through, even if you are publicly cleared.

So while maybe not "slander" this was a classless and irresponsible move on Bellevue PDs fault imo.

Heres more info on it

http://www.cbssports.com/nfl/eye-on-foo ... -by-police

Click to expand...

It became public knowledge because of a twitter statement made by some guy not associated with the Bellevue PD. It was picked up by ProFootballTalk and exploded. At that point the Bellevue PD almost had to make a statement of some kind. Pretty much right away they noted that they were investigating whether or not he was even at the location where the alleged assault took place. I don't think that's irresponsible.

The PD did nothing wrong. It's each individual's job to reserve judgement until the truth comes out. Sure, sue the accused, but the PD didn't do anything wrong.

therealjohncarlson":3uvimoh5 said:

You're probably right, there would be more legal precedent to sue the accuser. But I just feel like the PD should know better

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...Do you even think?

This would have looked far worse for Lynch if information had leaked that he was related to an investigation and the Bellevue Police Department had kept quiet about it, refusing to say a word.

Not every police officer in America is like the worst that Ferguson PD has to offer, guys. For Christ's sake.

therealjohncarlson":1vdcp6xb said:

So while maybe not "slander" this was a classless and irresponsible move on Bellevue PDs fault imo.

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Bellevue police said this week that the only reason the released a statement at all is because reporters were hounding them because the call from the chick came across the online police blotter..............so they wanted to head off the speculation by releasing an investigation statement.

I don't like it either, but we now live in the instantaneous Twitter world where there's no time to investigate anything before it's public knowledge. So Bellevue didn't have a choice.

So let's see what options were available.

The BPD could investigate a report that a crime was committed or they could not investigate.

I'm pretty sure that not investigating a reported crime would look (and be) far worse than looking into the matter, so the option to ignore the original report is out of the question.

Next...

They could release information or keep it to themselves

They didn't immediately make a press release, they began the investigation. Early on, a citizen tweeted misinformation that spread like wildfire on social media. This left them with the option of letting people continue to have only misinformation on Lynch, or they could release the fact that they are in fact beginning an investigation which there was an allegation made. They chose to do the latter. Not only did they only release facts, they made it completely clear that they were not even sure if Lynch was actually involved.

Once they found out that there was no way that Lynch could be involved, they could have either continued with their investigation until it was complete or they could have sent out a new release exonerating Lynch. They chose the latter.

Each step of the process it seems clear to me that the best choice was made.

I do hope there is reporting on the final outcome, because i'm interested to find out what this whole report really is about and why Lynch was mentioned in the first place. I have my thoughts, but I'm interested to know the facts behind this case even though it's not really seahawks related anymore.