Ruling Adds to Plotkin’s Leverage in Libel Action

A Sherman Oaks insurance adjuster, who was the only private citizen among 52 Americans held hostage by Iranian militants from 1979 to 1981, is still a private citizen, not a public figure, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge ruled Tuesday.

The ruling makes it easier for Jerry Plotkin, 57, to pursue his $60-million damage suit against a San Fernando Valley newspaper that he says libeled him in a story published the day after release of the hostages.

If he had been deemed a public figure for purposes of libel, Plotkin would have had to prove that the Daily News acted with malice, or reckless disregard for the truth, in running the story.

As a private person, he has the less difficult burden of proving negligence.

Televised Yule Message

Questioning during a three-week pretrial hearing focused on Plotkin’s activities while in captivity to get and hold public attention on the hostage crisis, including a televised Christmas message urging return of the deposed shah to Iran, a taped interview with a U.S. broadcaster and letters to his wife pressing her to keep the issue of the hostages alive.

Despite arguments of attorneys for the newspaper that Plotkin voluntarily thrust himself into a public controversy by such acts, Judge Christian E. Markey ruled that Plotkin’s conduct was, “in proper context, involuntary.”

“However viewed, the entire period of captivity was at gunpoint,” the jurist stated in a five-page written ruling Tuesday.

Attorney Alan I. Rothenberg, who had argued that Plotkin was and is a private person who got caught up in an international crisis and whose actions were taken under duress, was “quite gratified” by the ruling.

“It had always seemed to us that a private citizen who through no fault of his own becomes the innocent victim of international terrorists does not, as a result of that, become a quote, public figure, unquote,” Rothenberg said Tuesday.

Daily News attorney Daniel Fogel, on the other hand, said he thinks that the ruling is “in error” and that “it is our present intention to seek appellate review.”

“I think that the record clearly indicates both that Mr. Plotkin is a public figure and that this is a public interest case,” Fogel said.

Markey, however, disagreed.

“In the early morning of Nov. 4, 1979,” he wrote in his ruling, “plaintiff, an American citizen on legitimate business in Iran, was taken hostage at gunpoint. At that time, in the context of the law of defamation, plaintiff’s status was that of a private individual with certain legal rights. The events of the succeeding 444 days are now permanently inscribed in the chronicles of world history and upon the record of this court.”

No Change of Status

He said a detailed review of the record and numerous state and federal cases bearing on the issues “reveals nothing that compels or requires (Plotkin’s) status as a private person to be altered or the attendant rights to be forfeited, waived, lost or diminished.”

The judge said it is doubtful that a public controversy, as defined in case law, existed as of Jan. 21, 1981, the date that the alleged defamation of Plotkin was published. “The return of the shah was no longer an issue (and) even if it were assumed the release of the hostages . . . was a public controversy, the article in question bore no relationship whatsoever to the release.”

The disputed front-page story said Plotkin had been investigated by Los Angeles police before going to Iran in the fall of 1979, and it quoted unnamed sources as saying Plotkin might be und1701978214in drugs” in Iran.

“The article is utterly false,” Rothenberg declared Tuesday. “The most offensive portions were based upon alleged statements from alleged sources at the federal Drug Enforcement Administration and the Los Angeles Police Department. However, those sources have denied the truth of the story completely and unequivocally.”

During the pretrial hearing, Plotkin’s brother, Charles Plotkin of San Francisco, testified that he sent Jerry Plotkin to Iran in connection with his business of supplying labor for Iranian construction projects.

3 Marines’ Testimony

Three former hostages, all U.S. Marines, testified at the hearing that they collaborated with Plotkin on the televised Christmas, 1979, message urging return of the shah in exchange for their freedom. They also said it was their decision that Plotkin should be the one to read the message on behalf of the hostages.

In his ruling, Markey noted that certain precedent cases enunciating the standard of voluntariness are “inapplicable and readily distinguishable (from the Plotkin case), the principal distinguishing feature being, of course, the ever-present guns in the hands of the captors.”

He also noted that “at no time could it be said that (Plotkin) assumed a ‘role of special prominence in the affairs of society. . . .’ At no time has the public followed his words or deeds, paid him heed, or regarded his ideas, conduct or judgment as worthy of its attention. He had no influence on the affairs of society. He never voluntarily assumed the risk of public exposure.”

No date has been set for trial of the case. Markey will be the trial judge.