tonyahawk7 said:
California is my state, and my issue is that a fellow parent at my 10 year old child's school made the statement that my son was gay. She said this to 4-5 other students in his class, while they were standing in line. My son wasn't there but the children told him about it. Can I file any legal charges against this person and will it hold up in court???
My response:
Under California law, you don't, or rather I should say, your son doesn't have a Cause of Action.
Slander is basically an oral libel - - i.e., a false unprivileged oral statement to a third party (a "publication") which by its "natural consequence" causes actual damage (unless the statement is slander per se, below). [Ca Civil § 46]
Your son can't prove "actual" damages; e.g., a monetary loss.
However, with "Slander per se", actual damages need not be proven if the statement is presumptively injurious. An utterance constitutes slander per se if it:
• Charges any person with crime involving moral turpitude, or having committed or been punished for a crime;
• Tends to injure the person with respect to his or her profession, business, or office; or
• Imputes to the person impotence, promiscuity, or the existence of an infectious, contagious or loathsome disease. [Ca Civil § 46]
Your son doesn't fall within the ambit of the Statute because being, or not being gay does not involve moral turpitude, a crime, he doesn't have a profession, business or office, and being gay is not infectious, and is not a disease.
However, his and your feelings have been hurt and, perhaps, a sincere apology is in order.
Hurt feelings does not constitute a legal cause of action.
IAAL