Huckabee v. Time Warner Entertainment Co.

Since a public figure cannot recover damages for defamation without clear and convincing evidence that the defendant acted with actual malice,11 would hold, like the United States Supreme Court2 and the courts of thirty-seven states,3 that he like*431wise cannot defeat a motion for summary judgment without evidence of the same quality and quantity. This does not mean that the plaintiff in such a case must prove actual malice in response to the defendant’s motion for summary judgment. It means only that once the defendant has adduced summary judgment evidence that it did not act with actual…