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100 Mass. 194

Cook v. Cook

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court

Decided October 15, 1868

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court · decided 1868-10-15

Tort for slander. The declaration alleged that “ the defendant publicly, falsely and maliciously testified in the superior court for the county of Norfolk as a witness for one Fenner Cook, in an action therein pending in which said Betsey Cook was plaintiff and said Fenner Cook was defendant, of and concerning the plaintiff, substantially as follows, viz: Her (meaning the plaintiff) character for truth and veracity is bad. Her (meaning the plaintiff) moral character is bad.

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1868-10-15

How this case has been cited

Cited by 16 later decisions (1 by the Supreme Court) — most recently October 1967

2 federal appellate · 13 state decisions

4018681870188018901900191019201930194019501960decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Wells, J.

¶1This action can be maintained only upon the ground of special damages suffered by the plaintiff by reason of the words set out as constituting the slander. To sustain the action on this ground, it is necessary that the declaration should set forth precisely in what way such special damages resulted from the words relied on. It is not sufficient to allege generally that the plaintiff has suffered special damages; 01 ■ that he has been put to great costs and expenses thereby; or that he has had to pay one hundred dollars in costs to the othei party in the suit in reference to which the words are alleged to have been spoken in the form of testimony. It must be made *195to appear, by proper averments, how these special damages were occasioned by the words alleged to have been uttered falsely and maliciously. We may suppose that the plaintiff was a witness in her own behalf in the suit referred to, and that tbe case may have depended upon her own testimony; that, by reason of her impeachment by the testimony of this defendant, tbe jury were led to disbelieve the plaintiff; and that thereby she was defeated in tbe action and subjected to costs. But there are no allegations of this sort; and, without proper allegations to show the connection, it is not to be inferred, nor supplied argumentatively. Swan v. Tappan, 5 Cush. 104. Bloss v. Tobey, 2 Pick. 320. Snell v. Snow, 13 Met. 278. The declaration is insufficient in this respect, and the demurrer must be sustained.

¶2Judgment for the defendant.

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