Newspaper sues justice over $4 mil. libel case

By ERIC HERMAN, Staff Reporter - Chicago Sun-Times
June 13, 2007

A suburban newspaper accused Illinois' highest-ranking judge Tuesday of violating its civil rights, saying Chief Justice Robert Thomas used a court system he controls to win a $4 million libel judgment from the paper. The paper made the claim in a federal lawsuit against Thomas and his fellow justices.

Thomas had sued the Kane County Chronicle, a 14,000-circulation daily, over allegedly defamatory pieces by columnist Bill Page. Last November, a Kane County jury awarded Thomas $7 million. A judge reduced the award to $4 million.

By bringing his suit, Thomas infected the state courts with a "constitutional cancer," the Chronicle and Page now allege. For example, by calling fellow Supreme Court justices as witnesses, Thomas made it impossible for the paper to appeal because those justices then could not rule on the case, the suit says.

"The Chief Justice had a choice: His personal, financial interests or the constitutional interest of the Illinois citizens he would sue. He chose his own interests," said the suit.

At issue were columns in which Page alleged that Thomas cut a political deal on the punishment of Kane County State's Attorney Meg Gorecki, whose law license was suspended for four months. Thomas said the columns were false -- and a jury agreed.

Joe Power, Thomas' lawyer in the libel case, called the Chronicle's federal lawsuit "preposterous and absurd."

"We had a jury of 12 from Kane County -- their home county -- that decided this case," Power said.

But according to the newspaper's lawsuit, Thomas' power infected the entire case.

Rulings by the appellate court and others prevented the Chronicle from getting information it needed to defend itself, the suit states, adding that Page's sources were too intimidated to testify.

The federal suit asks that Thomas' libel judgment be thrown out.

Contributing: Dan Rozek

Copyright 2007, Chicago Sun-Times