Crime & Safety
Judge Tosses Amy Jacobson Libel Suit
The NBC-TV reporter lost her job after a video surfaced of her in a swimsuit at the home of Craig Stebic, husband of missing Plainfield mom Lisa Stebic. Her lawyer has vowed to appeal the case.
A Chicago news station was within its rights to air footage of former NBC reporter Amy Jacobson wearing a bikini at the home of a missing Plainfield woman, a Cook County judge has ruled.
Last week, a Cook County Judge Jeffery Lawrence threw out a libel lawsuit filed by Jacobson against CBS, which broadcast the report in 2007, and several other defendants, according to The Chicago Tribune.
Jacobson, now a co-host on WIND's "Big John & Amy" show, filed the suit in 2008. A former NBC-TV reporter, Jacobson was fired after CBS aired the video, which showed her, clad in a swimsuit, at the home of Craig Stebic. Wife Lisa Ruttenberg Stebic had gone missing several months earlier.
In a ruling filed July 2, Jeffery Lawrence said Jacobson did not prove that CBS fabricated unfavorable content about her, and that comments made in the CBS report were "constitutionally protected expressions of opinion," according to the Tribune.
Jacobson had been covering Lisa Stebic's disappearance after the Plainfield mom of two vanished on April 30, 2007. The CBS report aired July 10 of that year, prompting NBC to dismiss her.
In an interview with WGN after the CBS broadcast, Jacobson said she had been en route to a Chicago fitness center to take her kids swimming when she received a call from Craig Stebic's sister, who wanted to talk. She said she consulted with her husband, who gave her the go-ahead to take her kids along with her to talk to the Stebic family in the interest of advancing the story. At the time, Jacobson insisted she had done nothing inappropriate, and called it a "cheap shot" by CBS.
The libel suit maintained that she and her husband, who have since divorced, were forced to sell their home after she lost her job, and alleged that the report invaded her privacy and showed her in a false light, according to the Tribune.
Craig Stebic remains the only person of interest in the missing mom's disappearance, although no charges have ever been filed in the case.
Read: Lisa Stebic Family Hopeful After Peterson, Vaughn Convictions
Jacobson's attorney, Kathleen Zellner, has reportedly vowed to appeal the case.
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