The Times Lost $9.25 Million in Tuscaloosa Court

The New York Times just lost $9.25 million in Tuscaloosa for naming the wrong passenger. Billy Witz and the Times put walk-on Kai Spears in Brandon Miller's Dodge Charger on one anonymous source. The Times had Spears in the passenger seat while he was blocks away. Cooper Lee was actually in that Charger, and the Times already corrected the story. The Times still rolled into a nine-day trial like the name never happened. Witz apologized on the stand in Tuscaloosa. The Times knew the passenger was wrong before court started. An Alabama jury slammed the Times for $9.25 million. Nearly $7.5 million of that is punitive. The paper of record just took its first US article-defamation loss in over 50 years. The Times spent nine days in federal court on a name they had already corrected. $9.25 million for a Dodge Charger. The masthead that lectures everyone else about standards still had to sit there while the invoice explained what one anonymous-source shortcut cost. When the correction lands before the verdict and the verdict still lands at $9.25 million, the process is not your friend.