Readers, today we received an illuminating reply from the town’s attorneys on behalf of Select Board Vice Chair Shahidul Mannan. 

We’d previously sent Mr. Mannan a letter demanding that he retract his baseless and defamatory allegation that HopNews supports racism. Mannan made the comments at the Tuesday, April 16 Select Board meeting and then doubled-down the next day with the Hopkinton Independent to unambiguously state that he was referring to HopNews.

But thankfully, this has all been cleared up. Writing on behalf of the town (and presumably Mr. Mannan) Bryan Bertram, counsel for the town, offered clarification. Mr. Mannan’s “actual statement concerned commentary on HopNews’ Facebook page, posted by third parties, which were indisputably racist.” (emphasis mine). Bertram later confirmed that “HopNews may have no legal obligation to more quickly moderate its Facebook page commentary, Mr. Mannan was fully in the right to suggest that it should do so” (emphasis his). 

In other words, as suspected, Mr. Mannan saw something on Facebook, not HopNews. Facebook, as we’ve previously stated, is unmoderated and ungoverned by our terms of service. Not even Mark Zuckerberg is doing a great job of patrolling Facebook, as as anyone who follows the news knows. And of course, as Attorney Bertram points out, HopNews took down the post as soon as we were made aware of it.

I’m not sure why Mr. Mannan felt it was appropriate to directly name HopNews in the article in the Independent, and Mr. Bertram doesn’t shed any light on that fact either. 

As much as I’m glad we’re all in agreement that Mr. Mannan made an error, I do wonder why he didn’t save us taxpayers a few bucks and say it straight away instead of having the town’s lawyers write a four page letter. Wouldn’t a simple apology have been cheaper, easier and faster?

Bertram continued: “Again, and to be clear: this does not mean that HopNews or Mr. Thomas are racist“. Well, I’m glad to have that cleared up. 

I do have to say though that I am a little disappointed with Mr. Bertram. Like so many attorneys, he peppered his response with footnotes and citations, not expecting anyone to read them.

In defending Mr. Mannan’s actions, his central point was that “public officials like Vice Chair Mannan enjoy a conditional privilege for their statements. Public policy recognizes this privilege because public officials must be able to comment on important public issues without the threat of defamation suits.” In other words, according to Mr. Bertram, as long as a public official is acting in their “official capacity”, they can say whatever they want. 

To support this argument, Bertram cited Mulgrew v. City of Taunton, a 1984 case involving a police officer that had resigned and sought reinstatement. The police chief told the city council he was no good, and the cop sued his chief for defamation. Although I fail to see the comparison between the two situations here, what the Mulgrew decision actually says is that a “conditional privilege, on the other hand, immunizes a defendant from liability unless he or she acted with actual malice“. 

And that is where Mr. Mannan runs afoul of Mulgrew and loses his conditional priviledge. When he went to the Independent the next day, Mannan acted with actual malice, as noted above. Conditional privilege is also eliminated when there is “unnecessary, unreasonable or excessive publication“, and again, his comment to the Independent certainly qualifies on that count as well. 

In short, Bertram could have done better, but hey, Town Hall hasn’t exactly seen Legal Eagles soaring overhead lately, right? It’s great knowing that from 2020 – 2023, we taxpayers forked over $1,357,512 to Harrington Heep and Mirick O’Connell (the town’s labor attorneys) alone.

$1.3 million seems like a lot to me, but maybe it’s not to Mr. Mannan.

>> READ THE LETTER THAT YOU PAID FOR

Peter Thomas is the Editor-in-Chief at HopNews.