LOUISIANA
The Advocate
BY JOE GYAN JR | JGYAN@THEADVOCATE.COM JUL 18, 2016
A state judge Monday dismissed a Catholic priest’s defamation lawsuit against a Baton Rouge television station over its reporting of a long-running court case involving the secrecy of the confessional and allegations of sexual abuse against a now-deceased church parishioner.
The Rev. Jeff Bayhi contends WBRZ-TV defamed him in a graphic that stated “woman claims priest abused her at age 14” and “priest died while authorities were investigating.”
The graphic accompanied a January 2015 news report about the woman, Rebecca Mayeux; the deceased parishioner, George Charlet Jr.; and her pastor, Bayhi.
One of WBRZ’s attorneys argued last month before state District Judge Wilson Fields that the verbal news report was “completely accurate” and that the station corrected the graphic at the end of the newscast. The graphic did not include Bayhi’s name.
The lawyer, Sharonda Williams, acknowledged at the June 20 hearing that the station made an error but did not do so with malice toward Bayhi.
“That does not rise to the level of actual malice,” she argued in asking Fields, of Baton Rouge, to throw out the priest’s defamation claims.
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