(exact copy of an email received from Willie Nason dated 25th June 2002)
Re: Libel and Defamation of BAWN Publishers Literary Agency on your webite

Dear Tina Morgan and Ciara Grey:

It has been brought to our attention that your website, www.fictionfactor.com/alerts/bawn.html, has been using false and libelous information about BAWN Publishers Inc. Literary Agency, in an attempt to discredit us.  Your false data has caused an enormous amount of damage to our company, not only reputation and credibility wise, but financially also. Furthermore in your efforts to destroy us, you are using us as a means of profit by selling your information and services for a fee, or directing the viewers to other sites, which also sell false and libelous information in association with the marketing or sale of your products and services is illegal.

It is possible that you are unaware of the legal implications and ramifications this poses for you.  So we believe that it is in our mutual interest to bring this matter to your attention.  We request that you remove all information, correspondence, comments and any other information regarding BAWN from your website within 48 hours, with the exception of a written apology for your error in judgement.

It is important that we exercise our right to protect our name and reputation that we have worked so hard to create, regardless of what others with a number of reasons wish to destroy. As the old saying goes, "Like there are two sides to every legal coin, so there are always two sides to every story". For you to take one side of a story and consider it totally true, without desiring to know about the client-agent relationships is what has brought us to this point.

State and federal law supports our position that "Libel is a defamation expressed in written or other graphic form that tends to blacken or that tends to injure a living person's reputation and thereby, expose them to public hatred contempt or ridicule, or financial injury or to impeach any person's honesty, integrity, virtue or reputation.  Libel laws protects individuals or businesses from unjustified attacks on their reputation.  A person is libelled if they knowingly publish or republish if the words of a second or third party, expose him (or her) to the risk of being: hated, ridiculed, or viewed with contempt, or shunned or avoided, or lowered in the standing of right thinking members of society, or discredited in his trade, business, office, or profession. Damage is, therefore, presumed without proof."

Please respond by letter: indicating your intention to cease & desist the use of our name, or any comments or statements given to you, from any third party or persons from your website within two (2) calendar days.

We hope that this issue may be resolved this way so we can avoid any further legal remedies as provided by state and federal law.

A copy of your page has been printed for our legal department and is being prepared in case you decide not to honor our request.


Sincerely,

Willie E. Nason
CEO/Chairman

And here is an exact copy of response from Lee Masterson, dated 27th June 2002

Dear Willie Nason,

It has been brought to my attention that the information contained within the article in question is a personal recounting of Tina's and Ciara's dealings with your company. I am happy to also include in this article ALL correspondence sent to Tina from you, signed by you, within the article - to verify authenticity of the information.

I am willing to amend the article to include any or all responses you desire to have posted, in a true effort to reveal "both sides of the story", but I will not remove the piece until this matter is further resolved.

All correspondences from your company have been saved and stored and the article was entirely based upon these correspondences from Bawn Publishers Literary Agency. None of the information included in print is falsified, nor has Tina stooped to denigration of your company name. The recounting of dealings with your agency is an anecdotal piece, based upon verifiable information. Nowhere in the piece does Tina seek to "destroy" your company. She simply tells our readers the events which led her not to accept representation from your company.

It has also been brought to my attention that you have falsified a portion of your own claim against Fiction Factor. Fiction Factor is purely a non-profit organization, as are the two organizations mentioned within the article. Fiction Factor is also offered free of charge to anyone who wishes to read it.

According to Australian law, this also constitutes a breach of the libel and defamation laws. If further pursued by you without rectification, this incorrect assumption by you can also be considered to be slanderous to my company name and reputation.

Looking forward to your response at your earliest convenience

Lee Masterson

And Mr. Nason's response, dated 2nd July 2002

Sorry for the delay in responding.  This is all we ask that you reveal the truth and amend statements made on your website that are truly incorrect and false.  No one can please everyone, but I wonder why you haven't attacked any other agents, only us.  That to me shows a distinct lack of character. However, since you never recieved a contract from us and you are makeing assumptions and statements based purely on an faq, that is not very professional.  We do not nor have we ever charged reading fees and to claim we do, based solely on what you think, rather than the truth is not good. So far as what they did in Austraila and they law, this is the US and our laws are very different.  We will be checking to see what changes have been made and it would be in your best interest to amend them to the point where it is correct.

Go to copy of Bawn contract, that we supposedly never received

Back to Bawn Article