Florida Jury Award $5 Million in Compensatory Damages Against CNN in Defamation Case – Punitive Damage Award Forthcoming

Sundance reporting for CTH 

CNN was sued for defamation by plaintiff Navy veteran Zachary Young. Mr. Young sued CNN for defamation after the cable network ran a hit piece against him and his company accusing Young of running a “black-market” rescue operation in the wake of the failed Afghanistan withdrawal. The hit piece ran on Jake Tapper and Jim Acosta’s segments on CNN.

The lawsuit progressed in the trial with the jury ultimately being handed the case for compensatory and punitive damages. Punitive damages were judged as warranted in the case because during the discovery phase of the trial Mr. Young’s lawyers were able to gain emails and internal correspondence within CNN showing intentional malice and willful intent to target and lie about Zachary Young.

Today the jury returned a verdict against CNN, awarding Mr. Young $5,000,000.00 in compensatory damages for his lost reputation, lost security clearance and complete loss of his business and income. The punitive damage award could be substantially higher and is yet determined.

FLORIDA – A Florida jury found that CNN liable of defaming Navy veteran Zachary Young on Friday and awarded him a total of $5 million in addition to finding that punitive damages were warranted against the network.

In his lawsuit against the cable news network, Young sought damages over a November 2021 report in which CNN chief national security correspondent Alex Marquardt claimed that bad actors were reportedly running a black market and charging exorbitant fees to Afghans attempting to flee their country after the Taliban retook control of it earlier that year.

Segments about Marquardt’s report ran on both Jake Tapper and Jim Acosta’s shows. Young’s name and face featured in both segments; he was the only individual identified by Marquardt.

Young’s legal team has submitted that CNN published “lies” about his business extracting people from Afghanistan and cited internal communications — which revealed that employees had doubts about the integrity of Marquardt’s story, as well as that Marquardt had called Young a “mf*****” whom he hoped to “nail” and agreed with a producer that the veteran had a “punchable face” — as evidence that the aim of of the story was to “hurt” him. (read more)

This trial outcome comes on the heels of ABC News agreeing to settle a defamation case against President Donald Trump for $15,000,000 which will be paid to his presidential library.