A Florida jury found CNN guilty of defaming a U.S. Navy veteran who helped evacuate people from Afghanistan following the 2021 withdrawal.
The jury found that veteran Zachary Young is owed $4 million in financial damages and $1 million in emotional damages.
The lawsuit centered on a 2021 story where CNN’s Jake Tapper said correspondent Alex Marquardt claimed to find that “Afghans trying to get out of the country face a black market full of promises, demands of exorbitant fees, and no guarantee of safety or success,” Fox News reported.
Marquardt later put Young’s photo on the screen and said the veteran was asking for $14,500 per person to take them to the United Arab Emirates or $75,000 to take a vehicle of passengers to Pakistan.
Young told CNN that those who were trying to leave Afghanistan “are expected to have sponsors pay for them. If someone reached out, we need to understand if they have a sponsor behind them to be able to pay evacuation costs which are highly volatile and based on environmental realities.'”
The veteran alleged that CNN’s terminology, such as “black market” and “exorbitant,” intentionally portrayed him negatively.
The judges wrote in June that “Young proffered CNN messages and emails that showed internal concern about the completeness and veracity of the reporting— the story is ‘a mess,’ ‘incomplete,’ not ‘fleshed out for digital,’ ‘the story is 80% emotion, 20% obscured fact,’ and ‘full of holes like Swiss cheese.'” The case was allowed to proceed.
“Young sufficiently proffered evidence of actual malice, express malice, and a level of conduct outrageous enough to open the door for him to seek punitive damages,” the June court document stated.
