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| Photo Credit: AP. |
NEW YORK (AP) — The family of a Marine killed in Afghanistan has revived a defamation lawsuit against Alec Baldwin over comments the actor made online.
The sisters
and widow of Lance Cpl. Rylee McCollum allege Baldwin subjected them to online
threats and harassment after he posted and commented on a photo shared online
by one of McCollum’s sisters, Roice McCollum, who had been in Washington during
the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection.
Baldwin had
donated $5,000 to the family after learning of the death of Rylee McCollum in a
bombing at the airport in Kabul in August 2021, just weeks before his daughter
was born. Baldwin had contacted Roice McCollum via Instagram, according to the
lawsuit.
In January
2022, Baldwin saw that Roice McCollum posted a picture of demonstrators from
former President Donald Trump’s rally taken on the day Congress counted the
Electoral College votes from the 2020 presidential election, according to the
complaint.
Baldwin sent
her a private message and confirmed she had organized the fundraiser for her
brother, the lawsuit said. She responded that her participation in the protest
was “perfectly legal,” according to court documents.
Baldwin told
Roice McCollum he would share her photo with his 2.4 million Instagram
followers and wrote: “Good luck,” according to the lawsuit.
In the
lawsuit, Roice McCollum said she “did not take part in, nor did she support or
condone the rioting that erupted” at the Capitol, and was cleared of any
wrongdoing after meeting with the FBI.
The family’s
lawsuit was initially filed in Wyoming but dismissed by a judge there in May
for lack of jurisdiction because Baldwin made the posts in New York and they
weren’t directed specifically at a Wyoming audience.
The current
lawsuit was filed in New York on Friday and seeks a combined $25 million in
punitive and compensatory damages.
Baldwin had
asked for the case to be dismissed in Wyoming, saying he was expressing his
political opinion and that claims by McCollum’s sister Cheyenne McCollum and
his widow Jiennah McCollum should be dismissed because he did not make any
statements about them.
In an email,
Luke Nikas, an attorney representing Baldwin, said “Mr. Baldwin donated several
thousand dollars to Ms. McCollum to honor her husband, and now she’s suing him
for more because she disagrees with his political opinion about the
insurrection that occurred on January 6th at the U.S. Capitol Building. We
expect to prevail in this lawsuit, as we did the last time they filed it.”