Legal Question in Civil Litigation in Florida

Re: Defamation

An interesting question. Normally there must be a "publication" to a third party for slander or libel to be actionable. Publication means it is said or printed to someone other than you. Bar grievences are confidential until they reach a certain stage. This creates three legal questions: 1. If it never proceeds to a public status, has there been a publication? It would seem to be, but this will require research. 2. Has there been a damage suffered? Accusation of a crime is considered slander per se. Thus you would be entitled to at least nominal damages. But what about other damages if it remains confidential within the Bar? Again it could be argued that there is damage to your reputation among Bar personnel, but they are supposed to keep it confidential, so how much real damage would you suffer? 3.If the grievence were to go public, would the Bar even mention you since it has no jurisdidction over you? Accusations in the context of judicial proceedings have limited privileges. Does this apply to Bar grievence proceedures?

This one would require some work and would depend, at least as far as damages are concerned, upon what happens next.