Joseph Cerrito v. Time, Inc., Life Magazine

Joseph Cerrito appeals from an adverse summary judgment entered by the District Court disposing of his action to recover damages for alleged libel from Time, Inc. (Time), the publisher of Life magazine in which had appeared a series of articles entitled “The Mob” on the subject of organized crime in the United States with particular emphasis on the “Cosa Nostra.” We affirm.

In one of the articles, appellant was depicted as head of a Cosa Nostra “fam ily” in California by a one-inch square picture of him accompanying a cartoon map of the United States titled “Your Land is Hoodland.” Similar pictures of twenty-four other men encircled the map, each identified by name and state of residence.

Appellant contended that he was a legitimate business man in San Jose and Los Gatos, California and had never been associated with the Cosa Nostra or any other organization involved in criminal activities; that the Life magazine articles were false and defamatory of him; that he was not a public official or a public figure; and that he had not injected himself into a public controversy; for which reasons the doctrines of New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, 376 U. S. 254 , 84 S.Ct. 710 , 11 L.Ed.2d…