Legal Commentary

Is this really the best that the Chronicle can do for its lead sports columnist?

By Tom Kirkendall

Remember awhile back when Chronicle lead sports columnist Richard Justice defamed Stephanie Stradley, a very good local blogger on the Texans and the NFL who now blogs at the Chronicle?

Well, ol' Richard is at it again.

This time the subject of Justice's venom is Alan Burge, who pens a very good blog on the Texans for the Houston Examiner.

Burge recently made a comment on one of Justice's blog posts regarding Texans GM Rick Smith, who Justice has been belittling for months because Smith fired Justice's friend, former Texans strength coach, Dan Riley.

At any rate, after Burge commented (he goes by "AJ" in the comments) on Justice's blog post, Justice responded by belittling Burge's comment. Burge responded by again challenging Justice's statements regarding NFL contract provisions. Justice responded by continuing to belittle Burge and concluded by accusing Burge of stealing "from others and calling it research."

Inasmuch as Justice has previously removed some of his defamatory statements from his blog site after publishing them, I copied four of Burge's comments and Justice's replies to them before Justice could remove or edit them (he has, in fact, done so now). Burge's comments and Justice's replies are set forth in the document below. Also included in the document is a comment from another commenter who was appalled by Justice's comments toward Burge and Justice's reply to that comment.

With "top" talent such as this, is there any hope for the Chronicle?

Full post as published by Houston's Clear Thinkers on April 07, 2009 (boomark / email).