Английская Википедия:Gibson's Bakery v. Oberlin College

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Gibson's Bakery v. Oberlin College was an Ohio legal case concerning libel, tortious interference, and infliction of distress. The case ultimately involved questions about the responsibilities of universities during student protests.

The case began in 2016 with an incident of shoplifting by a Black Oberlin College student at Gibson's Bakery and subsequent arrest of three Black students for assaulting a staff member. Students, faculty members and employees of Oberlin College protested against the bakery, alleging racism. The owners of the bakery sued Oberlin College, and Dean Meredith Raimondo in her individual capacity, for directly and indirectly supporting the protests, engaging in tortious inference of business, and for defaming the owners and employees. In 2019, a jury found in favor of Gibson's and awarded $44 million in compensatory and punitive damages (capped to $25 million due to state law), plus $6.5 million in legal fees.

Upon appeal, in 2022 the Ninth Ohio District Court of Appeals upheld the verdict 3-0. The College sought review by the Supreme Court of Ohio; the court declined to accept jurisdiction. The College then agreed to pay the judgement and interest, now totaling $36.59 million. In December 2022, Gibson's confirmed it had received the payment in full.

Background

Gibson's Bakery is a fifth-generation family business established in Oberlin, Ohio, in 1885. Half of the city's 8,000 residents are students or employees—3,000 and 1,000 respectively—of Oberlin College. Local merchants are reportedly frequent targets of shoplifting by students of the school. According to police records, there were four robberies at Gibson's Bakery and 40 adults were arrested for shoplifting between 2011 and 2016, 33 of whom were college students. According to Gibson's, the bakery loses thousands of dollars to shoplifters every year. The owner of a nearby Ben Franklin store reported losing more than $10,000 a year to shoplifters. A college publication described shoplifting as a rite of passage.

2016 shoplifting incident

On Wednesday, November 9, 2016, underage Black Oberlin College student Jonathan Aladin attempted to purchase a bottle of wine using a fake identification card. Store clerk Allyn D. Gibson, a son and grandson of the owners, noticed that the student was concealing two other bottles of wine inside his jacket. According to the police report, Gibson told Aladin that he was contacting the police and pulled out his phone to take a photo of the student, which Aladin slapped away, striking Gibson's face in the process.

Aladin ran out of the store, and Gibson followed him across the street onto campus property where a scuffle broke out. When police arrived, Gibson was lying on the ground being punched and kicked by Aladin and two other Oberlin students, friends of Aladin. The police report stated that Gibson sustained a swollen lip, several cuts, and other minor injuries. The police arrested the students, charging all three with assault and Aladin with robbery as well.

In August 2017, the three students pleaded guilty, stating that they believed that Gibson's actions were justified and were not racially motivated. Their plea deals carried no jail time in exchange for restitution, the public statement, and a promise of future good behavior.

Student protest and boycott

Файл:Storefronts on College St., Oberlin OH (9430763377)B.jpg

Gibson's Bakery storefront, where the protests occurred

The day after the incident, faculty and hundreds of students gathered in a park across the street from Gibson's Bakery protesting what they saw as racial profiling and excessive use of force by Gibson toward Aladin. Jason Hawk, a reporter and editor with the Oberlin News-Tribune, testified that dean of students Meredith Raimondo was at the protest speaking to the crowd into a Megaphone and discouraging photographers from taking photos of the crowd. He testified that she used her body to attempt to block him from taking photos, and handed him a flyer. The flyer read, "Don't Buy. This is a RACIST establishment with a LONG ACCOUNT of RACIAL PROFILING and DISCRIMINATION." Counterprotestors also gathered, calling the students "snowflakes."

The Oberlin Student Senate immediately passed a resolution saying that the bakery "has a history of racial profiling and discriminatory treatment of students and residents alike", calling for all students to "immediately cease all support, financial and otherwise, of Gibson's" and calling upon Oberlin College President Marvin Krislov to publicly condemn the bakery. The Student Senate resolution was emailed to all Oberlin students and was publicly mounted in a display case at the school's student center, where it remained for a year.

Oberlin response

On November 11, 2016, the day after the initial student protest, Oberlin College released a joint statement by President Marvin Krislov and Dean of Students Meredith Raimondo, saying they were "deeply troubled" by the events and would investigate "whether this is a pattern and not an isolated incident" of discrimination. The statement was emailed to all students and posted in the Oberlin Review, the school's newspaper.

Raimondo ordered its campus food provider to suspend its purchasing agreement with the bakery, with ratification by Krislov. The agreement was suspended for about two months, which the school said was an attempt to de-escalate the protests. During a meeting with Gibson's, Oberlin stated that it would consider reinstating the business relationship if the bakery agreed to not bring criminal charges against first-time shoplifters. According to the civil complaint filed by the bakery, Gibson's was worried that such a policy would cause an increase in future shoplifting.

At trial, lawyers for the Gibsons introduced emails and text messages showed that some senior Oberlin administrative staff were angry about the conviction of the three students and did not want the College to resolve the situation with Gibson's. One assistant dean in attendance of the students' trial texted Raimondo from the courthouse "I hope we rain fire and brimstone on that store." In a email, Vice President of Communications Ben Jones pushed back against claims that Oberlin was hurting a "small business," calling the Gibson family a "massive (relative to the town) conglomerate" engaged in "predatory behavior toward most other local business. Fuck 'em." Tita Reed, Special Assistant to the President, responded, "100%!!!!!!!"

Retired Oberlin professor Roger Copeland was critical of the protests, writing a year after the protests began, "The time has come for the Dean of Students Meredith Raimondo, on behalf of the College, to apologize to the Gibson family." Raimondo reacted to Copeland's statement in a private text message: "Fuck him. I'd say unleash the students if I wasn't convinced this needs to be put behind us."

Senior administrators forwarded around an email by Emily Crawford, an employee for the school's communications department, saying she found the protests "very disturbing," and that according to her POC friends, "this is not a race issue at all." Reed responded, "Doesn't change a damn thing for me," and Jones responded, "Gibson's is not clean on this... The police report is bullshit, so obviously biased toward the Gibson's."

A former administrator said that Oberlin's recent drop in enrollment caused the school to be wary of disagreeing with its students. "A freshman from an East Coast big city might come to Oberlin and find there is little for a social justice warrior to do in a small town like this, so they get frustrated and make issues like this shoplifting thing bigger than it should be, and the school follows along."

Lawsuit and trial

Civil complaint

In November 2017, Gibson's Bakery filed a civil complaint against Oberlin for libel, slander, interference with business relationships, and interference with contracts in the Lorain County Court of Common Pleas. Gibson's argued that the college supported the protests that damaged its reputation and that the college unlawfully broke its contract with the bakery. In the complaint, the Gibson family alleged that some Oberlin College professors attended the demonstrations, joined in the chants with a bullhorn, and gave course credit to students who skipped class to attend the demonstrations. It also claimed Oberlin employees distributed boycott flyers and allowed them to be photocopied for free on school machines. Gibson's claimed that Oberlin faculty and representatives directly contributed to defamation said about the bakery, for example, prospective students were told during college tours that Gibson's was a "racist establishment" that "assaults students," and the Department of Africana Studies posted on Facebook that "their dislike of Black people is palpable" and "they profile Black students."

Oberlin responded to the complaint saying Gibson committed "violent physical assault" against Aladin, and that the bakery was "attempting to profit from a divisive and polarizing event."

Trial

The six-week jury trial began after more than a year of pre-trial proceedings since the original complaint. Three central issues were addressed at trial: were the flyers distributed during the protests defamatory; was the Senate Resolution defamatory; and did Oberlin College bear responsibility for those defamatory statements. Statements made by students during the protests were not part of the trial.

After the shoplifting incident, local police investigated whether Gibson's had a history of racially-motivated shoplifting reports. According to the probe, in a five year period, only six of the forty adults arrested for shoplifting at Gibson's were Black. Both college and police records showed no previous accusations of racial profiling by Gibson's Bakery. Former Gibson's employee Eddie Holoway, a Black man, testified that the racist allegations were untrue. "In my life, I have been a marginalized person, so I know what it feels like to be called something that you know you're not. I could feel his pain. I knew where he was coming from." Clarence "Trey" James, a Black employee at Gibson's since 2013, testified that he had observed no racist treatment of customers or employees. James also told the student-run Oberlin Review, "When you steal from the store, it doesn't matter what color you are. You can be purple, blue, green; if you steal, you get caught, you get arrested."

Much of the trial was focused on the flyers distributed at the protests. Jason Hawk testified that Raimondo directly handed him a flyer at the protest. Evidence was shown that Oberlin's director of media relations emailed him to retract it, and after Hawk insisted it was Raimondo, she emailed back, "He is a liar." During trial she admitted she gave him the flyer. Arguments were also made that Oberlin had at least indirectly assisted in the distribution: During the protest, Oberlin officials bought the protesting students pizza, and authorized the use of student funds for the purchase of winter gloves for students protesting in cold weather. Some professors gave credit to students who skipped class to attend the protests. Oberlin argued that this was not an endorsement of the protests; Gibson's argued that this sent a signal to the students that the College had picked a side.

For the Senate Resolution, the jury heard arguments that Oberlin had assisted its distribution, because it had given the student senate the ability to email the Resolution to the entire student body, along with permanently displaying it in a display case within the student center. In the same building that Raimondo worked from, it could be seen by students and visitors for nearly a year, but Raimondo did not request it be removed until shortly after the lawsuit was filed.

Oberlin argued that it had no responsibility for the protests and that Gibson's "archaic chase-and-detain policy" was to blame. Raimondo repeatedly insisted that she did not have control over students and could not have stopped the protests. Gibson's disagreed, pointing to the fact that students removed the Senate Resolution from display at Raimondo's request. Conor Friedersdorf, a writer for The Atlantic, argued that when Raimondo said she wanted to "unleash the students" at Roger Copeland, it indicated that college administrators at Oberlin "calculatingly wield some control" over protests.

Oberlin argued that any written statements that may have been made about the Gibsons being racist or having a history of racial profiling were opinions and could not be libelous.

Verdict

In June 2019, the jury found in favor of the Gibson family, awarding $11 million in compensatory damages, before further hearings on punitive damages and legal fees. In a statement a few days later, President Carmen Twillie Ambar vowed to continue fighting, saying, "This is not the final outcome."

The jury later awarded the plaintiffs $33 million in punitive damages, for a total award of $44 million. At the end of the month, Judge John Miraldi reduced the total award to $25 million because state law limits punitive damages. In July 2019, the court ordered Oberlin to pay an additional $6.5 million as reimbursement for Gibson's attorney fees and other legal expenses.

Oberlin released a statement disagreeing with the outcome, asserting that not only did the school not defame the bakery, but it also attempted to repair the damage caused by the protests. "Colleges cannot be held liable for the independent actions of their students." Attorney Lee Plakas, representing the Gibson family in the trial, responded, "The recent efforts of Oberlin College and President Ambar to reframe this as a First Amendment issue, while undermining the jury's decision, should be incredibly concerning to us all. Oberlin College was never on trial for the free speech of its students. Instead, the jury unanimously determined that Oberlin College libeled the Gibsons." Oberlin College president Ambar told CBSN, "There may have been some professors who were there operating in their own individual capacity, but they weren't representing the institution."

Local television station WEWS-TV petitioned Judge Miraldi for more than two years to unseal evidence heard at trial. In September 2021, the judge unsealed remarks Allyn D. Gibson made on his Facebook account from 2012 to 2017 in which he expressed resentment for being accused of racism and made disparaging remarks about a large portion of the local Black community. These posts were not offered or allowed as evidence at trial. The Gibsons' legal defense argued that since Oberlin College attorneys did not attempt to introduce the Facebook posts as evidence, they "waived any argument that these materials were admissible."

Appeals

On October 8, 2019, the college appealed the case to the Ohio Ninth District Court. Days later, Gibson's Bakery filed their own appeal, asking for review of Ohio's statutory caps on monetary damages, rulings made by Judge Miraldi on motions, and the exclusion of expert witness testimony in the trial. Oberlin College filed their principal appeals brief June 5, 2020. Oral arguments by the parties were made in the Ohio Ninth District Court of Appeals on November 11, 2020, and made public on YouTube.

On March 31, 2022, the Ninth Ohio District Court of Appeals dismissed both appeals. In a 3-0 decision, the court upheld the jury verdict against Oberlin and the cap in damages awarded to Gibson's. The court ruled that it was reasonable for the jury to conclude the Senate Resolution could not have had the effect it did without the assistance from Oberlin. Oberlin was ordered to pay the original decision's damages and attorney's fees.

Oberlin sought review by the Supreme Court of Ohio on May 13, 2022, and later moved to stay enforcement of the $31.3 million award and fees. The Court granted Oberlin College's motion for stay while it considered the parties' briefs but declined to accept jurisdiction on August 30, 2022, on a 4-3 ruling: Chief Justice O'Connor and Justices Kennedy, Fischer and DeWine declined jurisdiction, while Justices Donnelly, Stewart, and Brunner JJ. dissented.

Oberlin published a statement expressing disappointment in the Supreme Court's decision not to review the jury verdict or the evidential and procedural rulings of the Lorain County Court of Common Pleas. The bakery's counsel praised the decision and told reporters "Oberlin tried to frame this case with claims and issues that weren't on trial. This has never been a case about a student's First Amendment rights. Individuals' reputations should never be sacrificed at a false altar of free speech."

Conclusion

On September 8, 2022, Oberlin College announced that the Trustees had determined the college "would not pursue the matter further" and had agreed to pay Gibson's Bakery the sum of $36.59 million representing the judgement with interest. In December 2022, Gibson's Bakery confirmed it had received the full amount. The college stated, "This matter has been painful for everyone. We hope that the end of the litigation will begin the healing of our entire community."

On April 17, 2023, Oberlin College filed suit against its insurance companies for refusing to cover the judgement paid to Gibson's Bakery. The suit is being argued in the Lorain County Court of Common Pleas. According to the filing, Oberlin performed mock jury exercises in April 2019 and determined it was likely it would lose the Gibson's lawsuit; however, its insurance companies refused to fund a settlement even after Oberlin negotiated an offer to avoid trial for less than $10 million.

Reactions

According to Daniel McGraw, a reporter who covered the trial, the largest contributing factor to the protests was the election of Donald Trump as President the day before. In the opinion of attorney and Cornell law professor William A. Jacobson, "On a different campus on a different day, it is unlikely a simple shoplifting case would have gained much attention." Longtime Black Oberlin resident Eric Gaines testified, "The election occurred the night before.... People were anxious and it was like a time bomb ready to explode." In his November 2016 letter to faculty and students, Oberlin President Krislov acknowledged the relationship between the protests and the "fears and concerns that many are feeling in response to the outcome of the presidential election."