High court: Article was not libelous

A judge and district attorney said they were maligned.
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) -- A news weekly's fictional article about a 6-year-old girl getting arrested over a book report was recognizable as satire and did not libel two officials involved in a similar real-life case, the Texas Supreme Court ruled Friday.
Under the 8-0 decision, Denton County Court-at-law Judge Darlene Whitten and District Attorney Bruce Isaacks will get nothing in their lawsuit against the Dallas Observer.
The weekly's 1999 article, headlined "Stop the Madness," parodied the judge's decision weeks earlier to jail a 13-year-old pupil for reading a graphic Halloween story in class. The fictional article was about a girl jailed for a school report on the Maurice Sendak picture book "Where the Wild Things Are."
In the parody, the judge is fictitiously quoted as admonishing the girl, who wore "handcuffs and ankle shackles."
"Any implication of violence in a school situation, even if it was just contained in a first-grader's book report, is reason enough for panic and overreaction," the newspaper had Judge Whitten saying. "It's time for you to grow up, young lady, and it's time for us to stop treating kids like children."
Judge Whitten and Isaacks, who ultimately dropped the actual case, said the fictional article was presented as news and damaged their reputations. Their attorney said some people -- even lawyers, college professors and other journalists -- thought the story was true.
"It attributed quotes to them that they did not say, and it made them appear as if they had committed actual crimes and unethical conduct with regard to a child, who turns out to be fictional," said Mike Whitten, the attorney who represented the two officials and is married to Judge Whitten.
The attorney said he may ask the Texas Supreme Court for a re-hearing.
The attorney for Phoenix-based New Times Inc., which publishes the Observer, argued the article was clearly satire when read in its entirety and was protected by the First Amendment.
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