Ingles v. Dively

In this defamation case, Robert C. Dively sued McClanahan Ingles seeking damages for Ingles’s statements describing Dively, inter alia, as a criminal, a thief, and a convicted thief. The jury returned a verdict for Dively, awarding him both compensatory and punitive damages. On appeal, we consider Ingles’s assertions that the trial court erred in admitting a newspaper article into evidence because its probative value was outweighed by its prejudicial effect on the jury, that Ingles’s statements were not defamatory as a matter of law, and that the evidence was insufficient to support an award…