Marriott Says It Told Insurance Company to Stop 'Blame the Rape Victim' Special Defense

had "failed to exercise due care for her own safety and the safety of her children and proper use of her senses and facilities."

The moron who said this should be behind the bars, in the same cell with the rapist. Damn!

Steve from frye boots ( http://www.fryeboots.org )

I think it's sad that the real issue in this case is being overlooked by a bunch of legal crap. And it is completely soulless that the insurance company would play the blame the victim card in order to save themselves a buck, as Nordette said. This woman suffered a truly violent crime. What happened to people's decency? 

 Nordette, I agree with your use of court documents and I applaud the job you've done.

When I first read the story, I thought about some of the
bonehead things that came out of corporate PR shops in which I used to
work, and how people who are perfectly sensible and humane under normal
circumstances ended up saying and doing stupid and heartless things
because the were focused on a narrow objective (eg, reduce the
company's liability) instead of the fundamental principle (ie, a human
being in a parking garage is not responsible for someone else's
decision and ability to rape her in front of her small children.) My
guess was that the lawyer who came up with that arrant nonsense
normally spends all day writing defenses of that type in response to
lesser incidents (as in "Our client is not liable for the theft of the
prize ouija board from the guest's vehicle, because guest failed to
lock said vehicle before exiting the parking garage.")

Early in my career, I had a job in which one of my regular tasks
was to write background sheets about various types of cancers. In each
of these, I included a description of a biopsy. I had a boilerplate
graf explaining that it was a routine procedure, blah, blah, blah. One
day, in response to a patient query, I had to produce a backgrounder on
heart cancer. I was 21; it hadn't even occurred to me that you could
get cancer there. Robotically, I inserted the boilerplate about the
biopsy. Fortunately, my boss gently chided me by asking, "Do you really
think removing heart tissue is routine?" Of course, I was mortified. It
was a great lesson for me.

I can only hope the attorney who wrote that dreck on behalf of the Marriott is feeling similarly chastened.

KimBlogHer Contributing Editor ( http://blogher.org/blog/kim-pearson )|Professor Kim ( http://professorkim.blogspot.com/ )|

Nordette, I commend you for the fabulous job you've done of pulling together examples of how humanity goes wrong when it puts capitalism above basic compassion. The amount of work and passion you've put into this is obvious. I'm really, really impressed.

While you and Josh both make excellent points, I'm stuck on who cares when it was or wasn't filed? It was wrong. In all of these cases, the companies acted without regard for another human's suffering. 

Americans have to stop hiding behind precedents and act with common sense in cases like these. Your point is good -- did Wal-Mart really need that $400k? Wouldn't it have made more sense to let them keep it and publicize that instead? Wouldn't that have brought more support for the brand? I fail to understand why some brands do amazing cause-based marketing in one branch of the corporate campus and squeeze their employees on healthcare in another branch. We fail to take care of our own, and we are losing our collective compassion one court case at a time.

It's wrong, and it makes me sick. 

The lawyers quibble with the details because details can be proved correct or incorrect. They're ignoring the larger questions of morality, of right and wrong. Ethics have gone out the window in the race to satisfy The Street. We're turning into Orwell's pigs, and it's got to stop.

So thank you, Nordette, for drawing attention to these issues. But what can we do about it? What will we do about it?

Rita Arens writes at Surrender Dorothy ( http://surrenderdorothy.typepad.com ) and BlogHer and is the editor of Sleep is for the Weak ( http://tinyurl.com/9pg62e ).

There's still no proof that Marriott's version of events is correct. The facts are that someone acting on Marriott's behalf filed an offensive special defense blaming the victim and after it blew up in the press, the defense was withdrawn. Everything else is Marriott PR spin for which I'll give them the benefit of the doubt. 

In the world of PR, Marriott doesn't get off the hook if it can point a finger at an insurance company. If someone acts on your behalf, as the insurance company was acting on Marriott's behalf and using Marriott's name, the responsibility still lies with the Marriott. It's their name and no matter what its attorney says, the fact is still somebody acting on Marriott's behalf blamed a rape victim for being raped.

The Stamford Advocate's reporter acted with due diligence. She contacted the Marriott and was told at first "no comment" and the Marriott's attorney didn't contact her until after the mess hit the fan, and the company's first response, which was included in the first post here at BlogHer, said they couldn't discuss the matter at all. 

If the first official response from the company had said what its Tuesday night statement said, that the language did not fit Marriott's corporate culture and was a "mistake" that they wanted withdrawn, it would have made it into the first BlogHer post here.  One must ask if the Tuesday night statement accurately reflects Marriott's culture, then why wasn't it the statement the company presented Friday night?

The story was not misreported. It was simply reported without the Marriott chiming in with a well-crafted PR message until they saw how much damage had been done over the weekend.

There's still no proof that Marriott requested the defense be yanked before the screams of boycott. They've produced nothing in writing that indicates such a request was made. But the "special defense" is a legal document with Marriott's name on it. They can't run from that.

We've aired the story, but Marriott should learn a lesson from this that most people would think a big corporation would know already: Don't let anyone file a legal document concerning a sensitive subject matter on your behalf that you have not explicitly approved. 

My sympathy for the company is minimal. My advice to Marriott is draft a new contract with your insurer telling it to never use language that blames a woman for her own rape again and get your hotel managers some media training.  Saying "no comment" to a reporter is the kiss of death. 

Again, I cut them slack for admitting the language was "a mistake."  That's it! 

As for bloggers calling for a boycott, blogs are opinion vehicles written in the first person. This story resonated with bloggers. I'm glad it came out and given some of the responses bashing Jane Doe on the first post at BlogHer, it seems there are people who still haven't gotten the message that blaming the victim is wrong. 

Instead of seeing the story as "Poor Marriott. It asked weeks ago for that defense to be removed and it wasn't," people may see it just as easily as, "Hmph! If Marriott thought blaming the victim was so horrible and really did ask the defense to be stopped "weeks ago" then why wasn't it withdrawn the very next day?"  Something's fishy. 

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

Thanks Nordette for pointing out my (major!) error - it does indicate the plantiff requested the revision on 7/13, not Marriott.  Really wish we had the court docs...Marriott did, however, mention an insurance company in the second statement about the withdrawal.  Though I don't think whether they mentioned it or not really helps us understand the underlying facts any better.

I believe the big lesson in this whole thing is that we have to be careful and take responsibility for what we write whether we are print journalists, web journalists, or bloggers.

It's easy to put together sensationalist stories without a complete set of facts, as the Stamford Advocate did (Sells papers.  How many of us had heard of the Stamford Advocate before this story?).  It's easy for bloggers and other print media to report the Stamford Advocate story as if it were fact.  And it is easy for tens or hundreds of thousands of people to read these stories online and assume they are fact.  In the process, reputations get damaged, companies get boycotted, and, in some cases, individuals get hurt.

And, it is nearly impossible to correct errors as new facts come out.  We're having the discussion on this blog, but how many others blogs are not so informed or not bothering to update?  Even with the new info, how many people are not bothering to read it and continuing to post comments slamming Marriott or the victim on BlogHer?  Check out the boycott list at momsrising, too - still going strong.

For better or worse, this is the new "crowd-sourced journalism" world we live in.  Would be an interesting topic for the annual BlogHer conference in New York!

Josh Kirschner

Thank you, Josh. Your comments are a testament to the benefits of crowd-sourced journalism. :-) I checked Marriott's website for its statement and someone posted it at 8:00 Tuesday night ( http://www.marriott.com/news/detail.mi?marrArticle... ).

I'm willing to give Marriott the benefit of the doubt and cut it some slack because its offical statement admits the the language of the special defense" was a "mistake." However, the request does not appear in the court detail, which you brought to our attention (thank you), and the court detail does not support Marriott's (its attorney's) contention. *Special note here: Such a request would not appear in the court detail if Marriott made the request to an individual attorney.*

Still, unless the Connecticut Courts website has a typo (which is quite possible), Marriott did not request a revision to its special defense. Jane Doe, the plaintiff and victim, requested a revision. The CT Courts have it as filed by "P."

It seems to me that if the plaintiff had made this request it would be an objection and not a request, but I'm not a lawyer. I wish there was an attorney licensed in CT who could tell us if the plaintiff could make such a request, perhaps due to the offensive langauge, but as I said, it could be a big fat typo by the courts. I'd call and ask if it's a typo, but who has the time to wait for a state government office to give a straight answer about a potential human error?

If Marriott's insurance company filed the request for revision, however, it should take the time to get the "P" changed to a "D" on the state's public website, especially if Marriott's telling the truth and the insurance company screwed everything up.

Here's a screenshot so you can see what I mean, and if you click the image you can see the larger screenshot.

( http://writingjunkie.net/marriott-civil-suit.html )

Thanks again for following up on this. As you may guess, there will be people who refuse to give Marriott any benefit of the doubt just as there are people who insist on bashing Jane Doe for filing the suit at all. As I've said in comments on the first post, it's too bad the insurance company can't take public heat on this. If Marriott made the request weeks ago, why did it take the insurance company so long to file the revision?

My Reservations

I'm being more generous than my life experience tells me to be, Josh, as I try to see Marriott's side. Having worked in PR before and considering that the company's official statements do not mention a "two weeks after" request for division, I lean toward believing something's fishy because the reporter at The Advocate doesn't have a direct quote from anyone saying Marriott made a request "weeks ago" as stated in the lead. All Marriott's ever said was it made the request "recently." Here's what the Stamford Marriott's attorney said as quoted by Monica Potts at The Advocate:
"From its inception, the legal case involving this tragic incident has been handled by the insurance company and its lawyers under the terms of the hotel's insurance policy, as is customary where an insurance company bears the risk of loss," said Stamford attorney Marc Kurzman in a statement from the hotel. "Interestingly enough, when we recently learned of this defense we requested that it be withdrawn." (source ( http://www.stamfordadvocate.com/ci_13140972?source... ))
It would seem a request made two weeks after the special defense, which as you pointed out would be a full month before The Advocate's story, would not be characterized as "recently" by a company that hopes to get out of hot water.

Public Relations professionals have a standard of ethics and if they follow those ethics they cannot willingly lie, which could explain why Marriott's official statement doesn't say "weeks ago." Could be recently was Friday, August 14, when the story blew up the web.

But I'll still give them benefit of the doubt because it's possible the request was made verbally and somebody dropped the ball.

PS: Interesting and perhaps to its credit, neither of Marriott's official statements mention an insurance company, not the first ( http://blog.stamfordadvocate.com/stamford411/2009/... ), which said it couldn't discuss the litigation, nor the second ( http://www.marriott.com/news/detail.mi?marrArticle... ), which declares a withdrawal of the offensive defense. Only its attorney, Kurzman, says the insurance company filed the "special defense."

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

I was able to find the chain of events that took place within the State of Connecticut Courts regarding this case.  The documents themselves are not available, but the dates of filing are.  It would appear that the attorneys for the defense filed their special defense motion on 6/30/2009.  Defendant requested to revise the special defense on 7/13/2009.  Defendant filed the revised special defense on 8/17/2009.  Here is the link to the case file: http://civilinquiry.jud.ct.gov/CaseDetail/PublicCa...

Based on the above, court filings appear to support Marriott's contention that they requested to amend the odious "special defense" two weeks after it was filed and one month prior to the Stamford Advocate story.  Though, there is no way to tell what exactly was being amended from just the filing dates.

Also, here is the statement from Marriott on 8/18:

We wish to convey our respect and sympathy for Ms. Doe and her family, who were the victims of a horrendous crime at one of our franchised hotels in 2006. Fortunately, the perpetrator has been caught, convicted and is serving time for his offense.

It was a mistake to suggest that the victim of this tragic incident was responsible for the vicious crime against her. As soon as we learned that this offensive language was included by the insurance company’s defense lawyers in their response to Ms. Doe’s civil suit, we asked that it be withdrawn and it was on Monday, August 17.

This incident is not reflective of our corporate culture or ethical standards, and we apologize to all of our guests and customers who were so deeply offended by the words used in the legal pleading.

Since Marriott may have modified the defense prior to the bad press, it would demonstrate that Marriott is not hiding behind an insurance company, but actually doing the right thing and wisely (whether for PR or moral reasons) overriding the insurance company's defense tactics.

Josh Kirschner

Megan I've been baffled by the number of health care reform protesters who defend health insurance companies. I guess the industry's lobbyists and public relations firms really earn their keep.  It's also interesting to see how often the people defending insurance are older and don't seem to realize its Medicare, government insurance, that's done right by them, not the private companies they're defending.  You may be interested in this video here ( http://bigsole.blogspot.com/2009/08/health-inusran... ) from a health insurance insider who left the business. He's saying what we knew all along.

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

Blaming the victim is part of a larger social paradigm, with all these a traditionally marginalized group is at the receiving end.  If one is part of any group that is not the dominant group then they must be asking for it or done something to cheat the system & therefore deserve punishment. The same stereotypes get circled around & around.  Stereotypes are hard to break & often are socially accepted when more subtle than the Marriott case. 

thanks for the update on this case.

beth aka confusedhomemaker

http://theconfusedhomemaker.com/ ( http://theconfusedhomemaker.com/ )

On my personal blog I posted the first draft of this post, a reader, Le0pard13, in comments ( http://bigsole.blogspot.com/2009/08/marriott-blame... ), viewed this matter nearly the same as you do. Thank you for your passionate response and pointing out the fishiness of Marriott's displeasure with the newspaper. I hadn't thought of it.

Nordette Adams ( http://www.bookotopia.com ) is a BlogHer CE ( http://www.blogher.com/haystackprofile/viewprofile... ) & you can find her other stuff through Her 411 ( http://her411.com ).

and thanks for the update, Nordette

Laurie

The blog is Not Just About Cancer ( http://notjustaboutcancer.blogspot.com/2006/11/bui... ) and the book is Not Done Yet. ( http://www.chapters.indigo.ca/books/Not-Done-Yet-L... )

Last week at President Obama's town meeting in Montana, one gentleman asked the President why health insurance companies were being vilified in the healthcare reform debate. 

With all due respect to that gentleman, all of these examples, and many, many more, are why.

Megan
BlogHer Contributing Editor, TV/Online Video ( http://www.blogher.com/blog/megan-smith )

My Personal Entertainment Blog:  Megan's Minute ( http://www.megansminute.com/ ) 

My Twitter Handle:  @MeganSmith

Sadly, I think we are still living in a "pass the buck" society, where anyone who gets called out for behaving badly can place the blame on someone else and claim that they were merely following bad advice or assuming that the people they had hired to take care of the matter knew what they were doing.

This doesn't fly with me.  I don't see any way that this defense could have gone through without someone from Marriott giving it the OK.  Big companies like Marriott have armies of PR people who make sure that the company's every move reflect the image that they want to project.  I wonder what they were doing when Marriott authorized this defense.  A company's legal filings are just as important as its bedsheets, its advertising, and anything else.  If your company name is going to be on it, you had damn well better make sure it's something you are willing to stand by.

Also, notice how the Marriott staff are "surprised and distressed" not by the fact that this outrageous defense went forward with their company name on it, but by the Advocate's reporting on the matter?  Another great passing the buck tactic.  The problem isn't what we did; it's the media's fault for getting the facts wrong or reporting the story at all.

My sympathies in these cases lie with the victims, not the supposedly poor big companies who are just innocent victims of bad advice of helpless to change their policies for fear of setting a bad precedent or whatever the next excuse is going to be.

Sara

www.inkandpixelclub.com ( http://www.inkandpixelclub.com )