Clem v. Doe [1]

On August 25, 2008, a Kentucky college student who was kicked out of a mall for wearing a short dress filed suit in Kentucky state court against an anonymous commenter for allegedly posting a defamatory comment about her on a newspaper's website.  According to news reports, the comment appeared on the Richmond Register's site on Aug. 13, 2008, under a story about the mall incident. According to the complaint, the commenter, identified only as 12bme, claimed Clem was kicked out because she exposed herself to another woman and her children. 

The newspaper subsequently deleted the comment and banned 12bme from the site for violating the site's terms of service. Clem filed suit against 12bme and subpoenaed the Register for the identity of the poster. According to the Student Press Law Center, the newspaper opposed Clem's subpoena, claiming that the identity of the commenter  should fall under the Kentucky's reporter shield law because a Register reporter wrote an article about the lawsuit, which mentioned the comment.