By Pat Murphy
BridgeTower Media Newswires
BOSTON, MA -- Nothing personal.
An Andover attorney-ophthalmologist will have to break out his travelin’ shoes if he wants to sue a Maryland personal injury firm for libel based on the content of a blog post reporting a medical-malpractice verdict against him.
U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani recently ruled that Maryland law firm Gilman & Bedigian and founding partner H. Briggs Bedigian are not subject to personal jurisdiction in Massachusetts, dismissing the claims filed against them by Dr. Adam P. Beck and his spouse, Bethany Carey.
“Here, Bedigian Defendants published a blog post on the law firm website, including Beck’s name and profession as an ophthalmologist,” Talwani wrote in her Aug. 3 decision in Beck v. Fradette. “However, absent conclusory allegations, Plaintiffs have not proffered evidence that Bedigian Defendants specifically targeted Beck, knew he lived in Massachusetts at the time the blog post was published, or intended to harm his reputation in Massachusetts.”
Ironically, Bedigian and his firm became the target of Beck’s ire as a result of their blogging about a case with which they had no involvement.
According to court records, Beck’s headaches began in 2014 when he was sued for medical malpractice in New Hampshire state court. Plaintiffs’ counsel in the med-mal case was Richard E. Fradette of Beliveau, Fradette & Gallant in Manchester.
Beck appealed after the jury returned a verdict against him and awarded damages to the med-mal plaintiff and her husband.
While an appeal was pending, the parties entered into a confidential settlement.
At that point, the Bedigian defendants entered the picture. With its main office in Timonium, Maryland, Gilman & Bedigian during the relevant timeframe allegedly advertised itself on its website as a firm that handled “birth injury cases nationwide in cooperation with local counsel.”
Despite the firm’s general claim that it conducted a “nationwide” practice, the record would ultimately show that Gilman & Bedigian never had an office or even handled a case in Massachusetts. Moreover, nothing in the record showed that the firm directed marketing efforts at Massachusetts.
Nonetheless, attorney Bedigian at some point got wind of the med-mal case against Beck and on Dec. 20, 2020, posted a blog about it on the firm’s website under the headline: “A NEW HAMPSHIRE WOMAN IS LEFT LEGALLY BLIND AFTER UNNECESSARY PROCEDURE.”
As alleged in Beck’s subsequent state court complaint against Bedigian and his firm, Bedigian wrote that “a New Hampshire couple was awarded $4.7 million after an ophthalmologist was found guilty of performing a procedure that left the woman legally blind.”
Moreover, the blog post repeated statements allegedly made by Fradette in a post-trial interview, including statements that “any other competent ophthalmologist wouldn’t have used that method of treatment, especially given [my client’s] previous medical history,” “Dr. Beck was unqualified to be making these kinds of decisions,” and “[h]e didn’t have the training to do what he was doing, that’s the bottom line.”
Beck and his spouse thereafter sued Bedigian, his firm and Fradette in Essex Superior Court, alleging breach of the confidentiality agreement in the New Hampshire case as well as various inaccuracies in Bedigian’s blog post.
With respect to the Bedigian defendants, Beck asserted multiple claims including libel, slander, invasion of privacy, and unfair business practices under Chapter 93A.
After the case was removed to federal court, Talwani concluded that the Maryland defendants were entitled to dismissal because personal jurisdiction did not exist under either Massachusetts’ long-arm statute or due process standards.
With respect to due process, Talwani wrote that the Bedigian defendants through their sworn affidavits established that they had no “continuous and systematic” contacts with Massachusetts to support general jurisdiction.
The judge further concluded that the record did not support a finding of specific jurisdiction.
“Plaintiffs have not proffered anything other than the fact that Bedigian Defendant’s website is accessible in Massachusetts,” Talwani wrote. “As such, the court finds that Bedigian Defendants did not purposefully avail themselves of Massachusetts.”
A member of the Massachusetts bar in addition to being an ophthalmologist, Beck is representing himself and his wife in the federal case. Beck did not respond to a request for comment prior to deadline.
Boston civil litigator Tyler E. Chapman says he can find no fault with Talwani’s adjudication of the personal jurisdiction question.
“Her decision really turned on the inability of the plaintiffs to come forward with specific facts to support their allegations,” Chapman says. “For example, there was the issue of whether the defendants intended to do business in Massachusetts.”
The Todd & Weld litigator also finds noteworthy the judge’s citing of the fact that Beck was unable to introduce any evidence to support his allegation that the Bedigian defendants used Beck’s name and the New Hampshire med-mal case in the blog post to attract business in Massachusetts.
“As a litigator and practitioner, this case is a reminder that if you’re going to attempt to convince a judge that you have personal jurisdiction, you better be specific and you can’t rely on speculation or conjecture,” Chapman says.
The Boston lawyer for Bedigian and his firm, William T. Bogaert of Wilson, Elser, Moskowitz, Edelman & Dicke, did not respond to a request for comment.
