Do I have to hire an attorney if a book was written with my name all throughout without my permission?
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Do I have to hire an attorney if a book was written with my name all throughout without my permission?
It’s completely slandering me and my reputation. What do I do?
Asked on August 22, 2014 under Personal Injury, Idaho
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 9 years ago | Contributor
If you are being defamed (defamation is when your reputation is damaged by what someone else says, if it is untrue--see below; slander is oral, or spoken defamation while liable is written defamation, so what you describe may be liable), then you could sue for damages, or compensation. You do not need an attorney if you're going to sue--you are allowed to represent yourself, or act as your own lawyer--but it is a very good idea to have an attorney.
Note though that not every negative statement is defamation. Defamation must be an untrue factual statement which damages your reputation. True facts, no matter how bad, are not defamation, and someone may write about them; opinions, no mattter how bad are not defamation either, and somone can write about them, too.
So, for example (and to use an admittedly somewhat extreme example):
Say that a person was a member of the Ku Klux Klan. Someone could write a book or article saying that person was a member of the Klan, and that would not be defamation, since it is true fact. It would also not be defamation to say that the person is a racist, since that is an opinion. But it would be defamation to write that the person had participated in hate crimes if that person never did, since to write that someone committed hate crimes when they did not is to make an untrue factual statement which damages reputation.
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