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Greene: Inquirer Demeaned Belly Dancers
Updated: Wednesday, 21 Sep 2011, 5:50 AM EDT
Published : Tuesday, 20 Sep 2011, 3:46 PM EDT
PHILADELPHIA - Former PHA director Carl Greene has sued the Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News, claiming the newspapers defamed him – and made light of belly dancing, too.
Green parted ways with the Philadelphia Housing Authority on Sept. 23, 2010 amid allegations of sexual misconduct.
The PHA board voted 4-1 to oust Greene last year following a report written by former Mayor John Street and chairman of the PHA Board.
Litigation quickly followed and the PHA board was also temporarily replaced this spring by HUD.
Now the latest lawsuit involves Greene and his counsel, attorney Clifford Haines, suing Philadelphia Media Holdings over its coverage of Greene’s tenure at the PHA and its aftermath.
The Courthouse News Service obtained the new lawsuit and Greene claims the newspapers used 246 articles to engage in “commercial disparagement and trade libel and constitute the most pernicious form of malicious and groundless defamation."
The suit also takes issue with a meeting held by the PHA under Greene that included belly dancers as part of a diversity awareness exercise.
Greene’s suit said the newspapers portrayed the "diversity event ... crudely, and with patent bias and prejudice, maliciously condemned the rich and age-old tradition of belly dancing, demonstrating a lack of sensitivity or understanding of the diversity of Philadelphia."
The core claim of the suit claims the Inquirer and Daily News exploited Greene because it needed to sell newspapers and make itself more attractive at a bankruptcy auction.
"In a desperate attempt to make the newspapers relevant and attractive to auction bidders and to generate much needed readership and revenue, the Inquirer and the Daily News set their sights on Carl R. Greene,” the suit claims.
Philadelphia Media had no comment to the Courthouse News Service.