A Rome-based Web site operator has filed a libel suit in Chattooga County Superior Court accusing a Summerville newspaper, attorney and judge of conspiring to “maliciously defraud” her.

“Beginning on December 14, 2008 and continuing to the present, defendants have engaged in a concerted effort to defraud and defame Plaintiff and others to the harm of Plaintiff, through malicious slander and libel with the intent to humiliate Plaintiff and subject her to public ridicule and contempt,” the suit filed last week stated.

Teresa Watson alleges that Chattooga County Superior Court Judge Kristina Cook Graham uttered “libelous, false and fraudulent Public statements” that were then reported by the Summerville News, a Chattooga County newspaper.

Watson further alleges that Summerville based attorney Bobby Lee Cook wrote “maliciously false” letters to her business associates in order to run advertisers away.

She stated in the lawsuit the newspaper has “assigned libelous quotes” about her to members of law enforcement and further asserted the quotes were also “intentionally fraudulent.”

Watson has a series of articles posted on her Web site, www.romenewsbywatson.com, alleging that Cook and his daughter, Graham, are a part of an overall criminal conspiracy labeled the “Dixie mafia.”

No charges or indictments have been filed against either Cook or Graham.

Watson has been sued for libel twice recently. One of the cases awaits judgment in the Georgia Court of Appeals and she was found not innocent of libel last month by a Chattooga Count jury for a post, not made by her, on her site.

Neither Cook nor Graham could be reached for comment Wednesday. Representatives of the Summerville News declined comment.

Rome News Tribune

 

Last week AM 1180 Chattooga County Radio and www.chattoogainfo.com reported that Rome web site owner Teresa Watson had filed suit in Chattooga County against a judge a lawyer and a local newspaper.   In the original article posted about Ms. Watson’s law suit on chattoogainfo.com, AM 1180 did not mention the recent law suit against Ms. Watson.  In that case which was heard in Chattooga County Superior Court last month, Ms. Watson was found not guilty of libel by a jury, a fact which AM 1180 and chattoogainfo.com had reported at the time. However in an article posted on chattoogainfo.com from the Rome News Tribune, which was never aired on the radio, the Rome News Tribune mistakenly printed Watson was found “not innocent” in their article referring to the libel law suit that was filed in Chattooga County. The Rome News Tribune subsequently corrected their error.  AM 1180 did not catch the mistake in the Rome News Tribune until it was pointed out by a listener on Saturday September 12, 2009.  We are happy to provide the correction.