Carolina Journal is reporting that a federal Appeals Court has ruled in favor of NC Attorney General Josh Stein in his challenge of a 90-year-old state criminal libel law that makes it a crime to publish a derogatory report about candidates for public office where the speaker ‘knows such report to be false or acts ‘in reckless disregard of its truth or falsity,’” wrote Appeals Court Judge Toby Heytens. The unanimous panel agreed Stein is likely to win his argument that the law is unconstitutional. The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decision sends the case back to a trial court. There Stein had lost his bid to secure a preliminary injunction against enforcement of the challenged law.
