Backlash To Skokie Attorney’s Anti-Ukrainian Post Not Defamation, Appellate Court Rules

CHICAGO — A Skokie attorney's yearslong attempt to convince federal judges that he deserves compensation because people conspired to leave negative online comments about him and his business after he posted anti-Ukrainian remarks has been rejected again — this time by a federal appellate court.

David Freydin first faced backlash in response to a September 2017 post on social media, court records show.

“Did Trump put Ukraine on the travel ban list?! We just cannot find a cleaning lady!” Freydin said.

Freydin, a bankruptcy attorney licensed in Illinois since 2005, then made further derogatory comments.

"My business with Ukrainians will be done when they stop declaring bankruptcies. If this offends your national pride, I suggest you look for underlying causes of why 9 out of 10 cleaning ladies we’ve had were Ukrainian and 9 out of 10 of my law school professors were not," he said. "Until then, if you don’t have a recommendation for a cleaning lady, feel free to take your comments somewhere else."

In November 2017, Freydin and his law offices filed a five-count federal lawsuit against four female internet commenters and 10 unidentified people, or "Doe Defendants." It contained allegations of libel, false light, civil conspiracy, tortious interference with contracts and with business partnership.

"The Defendants together created a smear campaign against the law firm claiming that it is 'unprofessional' and that it 'discriminates [against] other nationalities,' and warns consumers of the internet, 'Don’t waste your money!!'" the complaint alleged.

"To this end, the Named Defendants and Doe Defendants took to Facebook, Yelp, Google Reviews and other Internet-Based Review sites to review [Freydin] with one-star ratings (out of five), despite never having had any business related contact with [Freydin], whatsoever," it continued.

In March 2018, U.S. District Judge Harry Leinenweber tossed out the entire suit and rejected Freydin's attempt to file it again.

While statements impugning a person's professional abilities can sometimes legally count as defamation, they cannot be if they are expressions of opinion.

"All the complained of comments by Defendants such as 'unethical,' 'unprofessional,' 'chauvinist,' 'one-star rating,' 'an embarrassment and a disgrace,' 'hypocrite,' and 'racist' are similar statements of opinion and are not factually verifiable," Leinenweber said.

As for the other counts, Freydin failed to allege sufficient damages and, since there was no underlying defamatory statements, failed the minimum standard for alleging a civil conspiracy as an initial plea, the judge ruled.

Freydin filed an appeal to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals, which issued a ruling on the case Friday. Circuit Judge David Hamilton penned the 18-page opinion on behalf of the unanimous three-judge panel.

While Freydin claimed that leaving an online review of a business without a direct consumer relationship made it defamatory, the judges pointed out there are other reasons to leave a negative review — for instance, an opposing lawyer who had a bad experience with him.

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Freydin, whose firm has not responded to a request for an interview, also claimed that calling him a "racist," "chauvinist" and "hypocrite" did not count as an opinion. The judges disagreed.

As for a comment that asserted that Freydin "has no right to practice law," according to the appellate court's ruling, the full context shows that it was meant in a moral sense rather than in the sense of not having a proper law license:

David Freydin–is an embarrassment and a disgrace to the US judicial system, he has no right to practice law. His unethical and derogatory comments, which target one particular nation– Ukrainians, show who he really is. He portrays himself as someone, who cares about the interests of his clients, the majority of which happen to be Ukrainian, but in reality, he is a complete hypocrite, chauvinist and racist. He does not hide his hatred and disrespect towards the Ukrainian nation on his personal FB page. Such an attorney–is an embarrassment to any law firm.

Not only are the comments at issue unverifiable, the context where they were posted is also important, according to the ruling. In this case, the remarks were posted on un-moderated comment and review sessions.

"We trust that readers of online reviews are skeptical about what they read, both positive and negative," the judges said. "But it is enough in this case that these short reviews did not purport to provide any factual foundation and were clearly meant to express the opinions of the defendants in response to Freydin’s insults to Ukrainians generally."

The appellate panel also affirmed Leinenweber's rejection of Freydin's claim that a one-star online review — with no additional comments — could be considered defamation.

"We do not see how a one-star review conveys any objective fact that could be false or true. A person’s rating reflects her own preferences, and preferences differ for many reasons. We assume that one-star ratings can cause substantial harm to a business," it ruled. "The power of a review does not change the fact, however, that there is no measuring tool to gauge the reliability of a one-star rating or a five-star rating."