Chief Billy Goldfeder, co-owner of FirefighterCloseCalls.com, writer of the Secret List since 1988, and a 43 year veteran of the fire service, was sued last year by an Illinois non-profit, Remembrance Rescue Project, over content he published in an email in 2014. The suit was dismissed today by Judge Anna H. Demacopoulos of the Cook County Circuit Court.
While the legal technicalities involved in the decision make it hard to comprehend, essentially Billy G. was accused of defamation over comments in the email that were critical of the RRP. Those comments were written by Brian Farrell and Billy simply included them. Brian is the Chairman of the Terry Farrell Fund, named after his brother, FDNY firefighter Terry Farrell, who was killed on 9/11. Brian was also sued by RRP, but he was dismissed out of the suit previously.
In her ruling, Judge Anna H. Demacopoulos concluded that the Communications Decency Act, 47 U.S.C. §230, protects those using the internet from liability for defamation for content that is written by another party.