SURGEON SEEKS SUIT'S DISMISSAL; ATTORNEY ARGUES ACTION WAS INTENDED TO BULLY.Byline: Karen Maeshiro Daily News Staff Writer Attorneys for a Lancaster neurosurgeon neurosurgeon a physician who specializes in neurosurgery. neurosurgeon A surgeon specialized in managing diseases of the brain, spine and peripheral nerves Meat & potatoes diseases Brain tumors, spinal cord disease Salary $245K + 15% bonus. sued by another neurosurgeon for libel and slander libel and slander, in law, types of defamation. In common law, written defamation was libel and spoken defamation was slander. Today, however, there are no such clear definitions. are asking for dismissal of the lawsuit on the grounds it punishes the defendant for exercising his right of free speech. Dr. George Perdikis' lawsuit against Dr. Abdallah Farrukh is a SLAPP SLAPP abbr. Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Partnerships - or strategic lawsuit against public participation The examples and perspective in this article or section may not represent a worldwide view of the subject. Please [ improve this article] or discuss the issue on the talk page. - which is brought to obtain an economic advantage over a defendant, not to vindicate a legal right of the plaintiff, attorneys for Farrukh said in court papers. ``SLAPP suits have been defined as civil lawsuits . . . that are aimed at preventing citizens from exercising their political rights or punishing those who have done so,'' the court filing said. Perdikis filed a lawsuit last September against Farrukh, Antelope Valley Hospital chief of staff, and Farrukh's former partner, Dr. Harvey Birsner, claiming they called him incompetent. In an attempt to address the increase of SLAPP lawsuits, the state Legislature passed a law stating that such suits could be thrown out if acts of the person being sued dealt with free speech in connection with a public issue or an issue of public interest, Farrukh's attorneys said in court papers. ``Surely there can be no issue of greater public interest than the competence of doctors practicing medicine in the community,'' the court filing said. State officials said Perdikis was formally charged in August 1996 with gross negligence An indifference to, and a blatant violation of, a legal duty with respect to the rights of others. Gross negligence is a conscious and voluntary disregard of the need to use reasonable care, which is likely to cause foreseeable grave injury or harm to persons, property, or in the deaths of two patients and accused in 1992 of performing unnecessary surgery on two other patients at Mercy Medical Center in Redding Redding, city (1990 pop. 66,462), seat of Shasta co., N central Calif., on the Sacramento River; inc. 1872. A principal tourist center for a mountain and lake region, it also has lumbering, food-processing, and diverse manufacturing. . The board's complaint, however, was withdrawn in December 1997 for reasons that were not made part of the public record, medical board officials said. |
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