Former Alabama Basketball Player Awarded $9.25 Million in Defamation Case Against New York Times
An Alabama jury has awarded $9.25 million in damages to former University of Alabama basketball player Kai Spears, finding that The New York Times defamed him. The lawsuit stemmed from a March 2023 Times article that incorrectly reported Spears was present at the scene of a fatal shooting. Spears sued the newspaper on May 30, 2023, claiming the inaccurate reporting caused him emotional distress and unfairly linked him to a murder. The Times later issued an editor's note acknowledging its error and correcting the story, revealing that a team manager, not Spears, was the passenger in the car involved in the shooting. The team manager was not implicated or charged. Spears' father, Christian Spears, stated that the family's initial goal was a simple retraction, but the Times defended its article, leading to the lawsuit and subsequent verdict after a nine-day trial. The Times has stated it had not lost a defamation lawsuit in the United States over one of its articles in more than 50 years. 
