State court blocks NYC broker’s defamation complaint

A New York City agent’s defamation case has been dismissed in the New York State Appellate Court, after a lower court had originally allowed the complaint to proceed. Christakis Shiamili, a principal broker with Ardor Realty, had sued the Real Estate Group New York, whose name recently changed to TDG/TREGNY, alleging that it had allowed “numerous false and defamatory statements” to be published on its site’s message board. Although the group had not published the statements itself, Shiamili claimed that it had encouraged the defamation by allowing the comments to remain online. The court, however, has halted the case on the grounds that the Federal Communications Decency Act blocks Shiamili’s complaint. The act states that providers of online content cannot “be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider.” Shiamili did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Real Deal. TDG/TREGNY officials were out of the office and also could not be reached for comment by The Real Deal.