Movie review: Jackie explores a new point of view

The myth of the Kennedys and Camelot is so interwoven in the fabric of American history and identity that we often forget how intentionally it was constructed to be just that. The style, the dinners, the decorations, everything was carefully planned to project a particular image that would inspire Americans and survive long after the […]

Day 10: Rolling Stone’s remorse in defamation trial

The final Thursday witness for the plaintiff in the $7.5 million libel trial against Rolling Stone was Sara Surface. A friend to Jackie, Surface seemed to have a purpose in alleging that reporter Sabrina Rubin Erdely had prejudged plaintiff Nicole Eramo. “She disregarded me because I didn’t fit the narrative,” said Surface. An email released […]

Day 8: Rolling Stone fact checker, Jackie’s friends testify

For a second day, former Rolling Stone fact-checker Elisabeth Garber-Paul took the stand to explain why she believed Jackie, the student whose fake gang rape story sent the University of Virginia campus into uproar two years ago. “She seemed to really care about getting this story right,”  testified Garber-Paul. “She was totally comfortable with having […]

Bad memory: Jackie testifies on Day 7 of Rolling Stone trial

If “yes, to my great regret” has become the stock answer for remorseful Rolling Stone reporter Sabrina Rubin Erdely, then her protagonist in the now-discredited gang rape tale—the one who sent a college into chaos two years ago—has found a mantra of her own: “I don’t remember.” Before a hushed courtroom in downtown Charlottesville, a […]

Day 5: A recording of ‘Jackie’ makes waves

Former Rolling Stone reporter Sabrina Rubin Erdely put in a third day on the stand Friday, a day spent answering friendly questions from the defense in an effort to show how a veteran journalist could be duped by a college girl named Jackie– the centerpiece of a story that became a libel trial. For over […]

Day 4: Erdely gives scarring testimony

“I found her to be very credible,” said the reporter on the podcast. “I put her story through the wringer.” This audio about “Jackie,” the now-discredited protagonist of a once-blockbuster magazine article was played for jurors, as the plaintiff’s attorney tried to crush the credibility of reporter Sabrina Rubin Erdely on Day Four of the […]

Eramo’s status: Public figurehood will determine how lawsuit plays out

A phalanx of lawyers assembled to argue motions in former UVA associate dean Nicole Eramo’s lawsuit against Rolling Stone, along with plaintiff Eramo herself, August 12 in U.S. District Court in Charlottesville. Eramo’s $7.85 million defamation lawsuit against the magazine, writer Sabrina Rubin Erdley and Wenner Media is scheduled for a jury trial in October, and […]

Flurry of filings in Rolling Stone lawsuits

Last week saw one lawsuit against Rolling Stone dismissed, while Sabrina Rubin Erdely filed an 86-page statement about how she reported the UVA-rocking article “A Rape on Campus,” and plaintiff Nicole Eramo asked for several issues to be determined in advance of her October defamation trial against the magazine and Erdely. On June 29 a […]

Frat brothers’ defamation case thrown out

A New York federal judge dismissed a defamation lawsuit on June 29 filed by three members of Phi Kappa Psi against Rolling Stone and writer Sabrina Rubin Erdely for the now-discredited 2014 story, “A Rape on Campus.” “Their defamation claims are directed toward a report about events that simply did not happen,” wrote U.S. District […]