Ed Law Briefly: Court Says Parents Liable for Negligent Supervision Following Son’s Defamatory Facebook Post

RCEd Commentary

Background: While at home a thirteen-year-old student (Dustin Athearn) and his friend created a fake Facebook page of another classmate (Alex).  The duo altered Alex’s photo and stated that she held racist viewpoints, was gay, and had mental health disorders. This account generated 70 other Facebook friends. Alex’s parents complained to the principal and both Dustin and his classmate confessed to creating the fake profile. They were both assigned to two days of in-school suspension and their parents were contacted. The profile remained accessible on Facebook for 11 months (several months after they were disciplined). The Athearns never attempted to learn about the content of Dustin’s phony Facebook page and never forced him to shut down the site. 

Alex’s parents sued in Georgia state court for libel, arguing that Dustin defamed Alex when he created the false Facebook account and that his actions resulted in intentional infliction of emotional distress. Alex’s parents also claimed that Dustin’s parents breached their duty to supervise their son and breached their duty as landowners to remove the defamatory content on their property. Dustin’s parents won a motion for summary judgment, a legal request to dismiss a case before trial based on legal defects.  An appeal was filed.

Issue: Are there important questions remaining about whether Dustin’s parents were negligent in supervising their son’s use of Facebook; or, was the lower court correct in dismissing the case?

Legal Principles: Libel is a legal claim alleging that someone has intentionally and maliciously maligned your character — in writing. By contrast, slander is a similar form of defamation, but involves the spoken word.  In a libel suit, plaintiffs must generally demonstrate three things:

(1) that false statements have injured one’s reputation; (2) those false statements are communicated to a third party; and (3) the content is understood by the third party.

Outcome: The Georgia Court of Appeals upheld part of the trial court’s decision and reversed in part. The court concluded that Dustin’s parents could be held liable for negligent supervision for defamatory comments their son created on his home computer. The court asserted, “Given that the false and offensive statements remained on display, and continued to reach readers, for an additional eleven months, we conclude that a jury could find that the Athearns’ negligence proximately caused some part of the injury Alex sustained from Dustin’s actions.” But, the court found that Dustin’s parents were not liable as landowners with a duty to remove the defamatory materials from Facebook. 

Lessons for Principals and Teachers:

• This is one of the first cases to suggest that parents may be liable for negligent supervision when their children post defamatory content on their home computers.

• The definition of defamation varies by state law.  In Georgia, libel (in abridged summary) is a false and malicious defamation of another that injures the reputation of the person and exposes this person to contempt and ridicule.

• In Georgia, under common law, parents are not generally liable for the torts (harmful actions) of their minor children merely because of the parent-child relationship.  In this case the parents failed to exercise reasonable care in supervising their child.

Georgia Appeals Court:
Boston v. Athearn, 329 Ga. App. 890 (Ga. App. Ct. 2014).

_{Note: This information is not intended as legal advice. Federal and other court decisions can differ depending on what region of the country you live in. State laws also weigh in on certain issues. All cases are for educational purposes only, and meant to demonstrate how courts or administrative agencies have acted in specific instances as well as to provide information that can bolster the overall legal literacy of teachers and administrators. Local school attorneys can provide more detail about local law.}