Rolling Stone Seeks to Overturn Jury Verdict in UVA ‘Fake Rape’ Case

Lawyers representing Rolling Stone will appear in court again on Thursday as they seek to persuade a Virginia judge to overturn a defamation verdict handed down by a jury last year relating to the magazine’s false reporting in widely touted “A Rape on Campus” feature.

The judge will consider Rolling Stone‘s request to throw out the jury’s verdict, which found the magazine guilty of defaming University of Virginia administrator Nicole Eramo, and awarded $3 million in damages.

Eramo’s lawyers successfully argued that Rolling Stone’s story, which centered on an alleged brutal gang rape at a fraternity house, and was ultimately revealed as a fabrication by the story’s primary source, “Jackie,” had portrayed Eramo as a heartless bureaucrat who enabled sexual assault on campus.

UVA Dean of Students Allen Groves said the Rolling Stone article was “designed to make an almost comic demonization” of Eramo, who was the school official responsible for handling incidents of sexual assault on campus.

Rolling Stone‘s attorneys are protesting the jury’s finding that reporter Sabrina Erdely acted with “actual malice”—that she knowingly included false information about Eramo in story.

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