## Facts

- A ten-year-old girl was involved in a street accident in Birmingham, Alabama in 1947; a photographer captured an unposed, action photograph of a bystander lifting her to her feet.
- The photograph was published the next day in a Birmingham newspaper as contemporaneous reporting of the accident.
- About twenty months later, a national magazine obtained the photograph from an illustration supplier and republished it to illustrate a feature article on traffic accidents emphasizing “pedestrian carelessness,” titled “They Ask To Be Killed.”
- The later publication used the child’s image in a context implying she was a careless pedestrian responsible for her injuries, although her accident did not necessarily support that implication.
- The child, through representatives, sued the publisher in federal court on diversity jurisdiction, seeking damages for invasion of privacy under Pennsylvania law.
- A jury returned a verdict for the plaintiff and awarded damages; the publisher appealed, challenging liability and the size of the verdict.

## Issues

1. Whether republication of a child’s accident photograph long after the event, as an illustration for an article implying pedestrian fault, could constitute an actionable invasion of privacy under Pennsylvania law.
2. Whether the “public interest/newsworthiness” privilege for reporting current events protected the later, noncontemporaneous, illustrative use that arguably created a misleading implication.
3. Whether the jury’s damages award was so excessive as to require appellate relief.

## Decision

- The Third Circuit affirmed the judgment for the plaintiff.
- The court held the jury could find the later republication exceeded the scope of any privilege tied to reporting a newsworthy event.
- The court declined to resolve broader multistate choice-of-law and publication-distribution questions because no material legal differences affecting the outcome were shown.
- The court upheld the damages award, finding no basis to treat the verdict as impermissibly excessive.

## Legal Principles

- Pennsylvania recognizes a cause of action for invasion of privacy, including unauthorized publication that unreasonably intrudes upon personal dignity by associating an individual with an unfavorable, misleading implication.
- Publication of photographs connected to matters of legitimate public interest may be privileged when used for contemporaneous reporting of a newsworthy event.
- The newsworthiness/public-interest privilege is limited and may be lost when a photograph is reused in a substantially different manner—especially when remote in time and used to illustrate a generalized theme that mischaracterizes the subject.
- In reviewing privacy damages, an appellate court generally defers to the jury’s assessment of harm to feelings and reputation absent a verdict that is plainly beyond permissible bounds.

## Conclusion

The court sustained privacy liability where a magazine republished a child’s accident photograph long after the event to illustrate an article implying pedestrian fault, concluding the changed context and misleading implication allowed a jury to find the publisher went beyond any news-reporting privilege and to award damages.


Leverton v. Curtis Publ'g Co., 192 F.2d 974 (3d Cir. 1951)