§ 25-840.01.Libel; invasion of privacy; damages; retraction; effect.

Section 25-840.01 rewards defendants who correct their mistakes and gives plaintiffs an incentive to ask for a correction before suing. Within twenty days of learning of the publication, a plaintiff must give each defendant notice by certified or registered mail specifying the statements claimed to be libelous or an invasion of privacy, and specifically requesting a correction. A defendant who wants the benefit of this section then has three weeks from receiving that request to publish a correction, in a manner about as conspicuous as the original publication. A correction published before a request was even made carries the same effect as one published afterward.

The consequence turns on whether that correction happens. If a correction was requested and not published, the plaintiff is not limited to special damages. If the correction is published, or no correction was requested, the plaintiff can recover no more than special damages — damages the plaintiff alleges and proves were suffered in property, business, trade, profession, or occupation as the direct and proximate result of the publication.

The cap disappears entirely if the publication was made with actual malice, though the section reiterates that actual malice cannot be inferred or presumed from the publication itself and must be proven.

The section applies to libel claims and to invasion-of-privacy claims under section 20-204, so it reaches both types of publication-based harm rather than libel alone.