Anthony Herbert (US Soldier) - Herbert V. Lando

Herbert V. Lando

Herbert sued CBS over the 60 Minutes segment that painted him as a liar. The charge stemmed from an appearance he made on the show, when host Mike Wallace surprised him by bringing one of his Army colleagues into the interview, who proceeded to deny the veracity of much of Herbert's story.

The case reached the United States Supreme Court (Herbert v. Lando, 441 U.S. 153 (1979)). The Court ruled that defendants have no privilege under the First Amendment which would bar a plaintiff from inquiring into the editorial process or states of mind of those involved in the alleged libel, if the inquiry was tailored to the production of evidence considered material to plaintiff's necessary burden of proof.

This ruling allowed Herbert to seek proof of the alleged libel.

In 2005 the U.S. Court of Appeals in New York dismissed the libel suit. Judge Irving R. Kaufman, a member of the three-judge panel, ruled that Herbert had no grounds to take his case to trial in a 43-page opinion. The opinion stated the CBS story was essentially accurate. To go to trial over some minor unresolved issues would be a "classic case of the tail wagging the dog."

Herbert was reported considering again appealing his case to the U.S. Supreme Court. It was Judge Kaufman who the Supreme Court reversed in the 1979 decision. Jonathan Lubell, Herbert's attorney, claimed that Kaufman has long been sympathetic to the press.