Arno v. Stewart

Plaintiff has appealed from an adverse judgment entered upon a verdict for defendants in an action in which he sought to recover damages for alleged slander because the defendant Stewart while conducting a television show referred to plaintiff, a paid performer on the show, as an “iron-clad singing member of the Mafia. ’ ’

Plaintiff contends that the failure of the trial court to instruct the jury that the words uttered were defamatory per se constituted prejudicial error; and that under the circumstances of this ease it was also prejudicial error to charge the jury that they should not…