Redskins owner Dan Snyder, dogged by negative press for years, is taking one publication to court for an article that listed years of Snyder lowlights. Snyder filed suit Wednesday night against the Washington City Paper over an article by Dave McKenna. The story included some statements that, according to the Snyder’s lawyers, were incorrect, an assertion that forms the basis of the lawsuit. Snyder’s associates have also called the article anti-Semitic, citing a photo of the team owner, used as an illustration, on which Satanic horns and a beard were drawn by hand.
The suit was filed in New York, where the City Paper’s owner, hedge fund operator Atalaya Capital Management, is based, sources close to Snyder said. It asks for $2 million in damages; the Redskins have said any money won would be awarded to charity.
Redskins Chief Operating Officer David Donovan said Snyder had been defamed by the article.
City Paper Publisher Amy Austin did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment. On the paper’s Web site, she wrote: “We have offered [Snyder] a forum to [respond] in our pages. … Should he elect to actually file a lawsuit, we have directed our counsel to defend the case vigorously.”
In a letter to the City Paper on Nov. 24, Donovan first raised the anti-Semitism charge: “How would you react if you were vilified by an anti-Semitic caricature of you?”
Rabbi Abraham Cooper, an associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, joined the dispute Wednesday, saying the drawing could be “associated with virulent anti-Semitism going back to the Middle Ages, deployed by the genocidal Nazi regime, by Soviet propagandists and even in 2011 by those who still seek to demonize Jews today.”
The City Paper flatly dismissed charges of anti-Semitism, saying Jewish staffers were among those editing and illustrating the McKenna article.
Letters from Snyder’s associates to the City Paper reference the paper’s shaky financial condition — its parent company filed for bankruptcy in 2008, and was bought by the hedge fund company for $5 million in 2009 — and warn “the cost of litigation would presumably quickly outstrip the asset value of the Washington City Paper.”
The lawsuit listed a number of alleged falsehoods in the article, with the most prominent being the allegation that Snyder forged signatures while with Snyder Communications.
The dispute hasn’t helped the Redskins owner’s reputation. One Tweeter called it “another terrible move” while another tweeted, “I thought the juvenile games were over.” But one poster on the team-owned message board EXTREMESKINS referred to the article as a “hatchet job,” while recognizing that Snyder’s lawsuit only served to bring the story national attention.
Snyder’s tenure as Redskins owner has been controversial since he purchased the franchise in 1999. The team is 86-106 with just three winning seasons.
His image wasn’t helped when the team sued season-ticket holders, including a down-on-her-luck grandmother, for failing to make payments on their ticket contracts. That suit was later dropped.
