Summary judgment requested on slander suit by current and former board member of the East County Fire Protection District

Cape Girardeau County Circuit Judge William L. Syler heard arguments Monday at a motion hearing in a civil lawsuit involving a current and former board member of the East County Fire Protection District.

The lawsuit stems from a complaint current fire board member Pamela Allen filed with the Missouri Ethics Commission against former board chairman Gary Fornkahl in November 2007.

The complaint alleged that by giving his son-in-law a promotion within the fire department, Fornkahl had violated Missouri law prohibiting nepotism.

Fornkahl, who resigned from the board on June 21, levied a defamation suit against Allen last May based on the complaint to the ethics commission.

The suit was amended to claim that the ethics complaint had libeled, slandered and amounted to negligent infliction of emotional distress for Fornkahl.

On Monday, Allen's attorney, J.P. Clubb, asked Syler to rule on a motion for summary judgment, meaning a decision would be made without the case going to trial.

Clubb argued in the motion that Allen is entitled to the judgment because the case is without merit.

To be considered defamatory, the statement would have had to have been published.

Her complaint to the ethics com­mission cannot legally be considered a defamatory statement because ethics complaints are private, and because Fornkahl was a public figure as an elected official, there were stricter parameters for what constitutes libel, Clubb argued.

Fornkahl himself placed the complaint in a public domain by filing the lawsuit and attaching a copy to legal documents, making it a public record, Clubb said.

Phil Dormeyer, attorney for Fornkahl, argued in his response to the motion that Fornkahl wasn't a public figure because, though he was an elected official at the time, his name had not become recognizable enough to be considered a public figure.

Syler said that he will take both arguments under advisement, review everything that had been submitted and make a ruling at a later date.

bdicosmo@semissourian.com

388-3635