3rd Circuit Spikes Football Fans' Signal Videotaping Suit

3rd Circuit Spikes Football Fans' Signal Videotaping Suit
Shannon P. Duffy

The Legal Intelligencer

May 20, 2010


A ticket to a football game doesn't come with any promise that the contest will be an honest one, a federal appeals court ruled on Wednesday, rejecting an appeal by fans who said they were defrauded in the recent New England Patriots "Spygate" scandal.

In Mayer v. Belichick, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held that a lower court correctly dismissed the suit on the grounds that fans cannot claim any "cognizable injury" that stems from paying to watch a game that is later deemed to have an element of cheating.

"Ticket-holders and other fans may have legitimate issues with the manner in which they are treated. However, the one thing they cannot do is bring a legal action in a court of law," Senior U.S. Circuit Judge Robert E. Cowen wrote.

"No one in the past has ever brought a legal action quite like this one," Cowen wrote in an opinion joined by 3rd Circuit Judge D. Michael Fisher and visiting U.S. District Judge Gene E.K. Pratter of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

At issue in the appeal, Cowen said, was "the alleged existence of a very specific but very different and unusual right: namely, the right of a ticketholder to see an 'honest' game played in compliance with the fundamental rules of the NFL itself."

Although the case was unique, Cowen found that the courts have consistently rejected comparable claims, such as the ruling that said boxing fans weren't cheated when Mike Tyson was disqualified for biting a chunk out of Evander Holyfield's ear. As the New York Appellate Division explained in that case: "that there was nothing in any contract promising a fight that did not end in a disqualification."

Cowen and Fisher had aggressively questioned lawyers for the NFL when the case was argued in April, suggesting to some court watchers that the 3rd Circuit might be poised to revive the suit.

But Wednesday's ruling slammed the door shut on any such claims.

"A ruling in favor of [the ticket-holders] could lead to other disappointed fans filing lawsuits because of 'a blown call' that apparently caused their team to lose or any number of allegedly improper acts committed by teams, coaches, players, referees and umpires, and others," Cowen wrote.

"This court refuses to countenance a course of action that would only further burden already limited judicial resources and force professional sports organizations and related individuals to expend money, time, and resources to defend against such litigation," Cowen wrote.

In the suit, a proposed class action, lead plaintiff Carl Mayer, a New York Jets fan, claimed that he and other ticket holders were cheated out of what they had paid for -- an honest game, played under NFL rules -- when the New England Patriots surreptitiously filmed the signals of their opponents.

Plaintiffs lawyer Bruce I. Afran of Princeton, N.J., argued that U.S. District Judge Garrett Brown of the District of New Jersey erred in tossing the suit out on the grounds that the Patriots' violation of the rule didn't harm the fans.

In his appellate brief, Afran said the case was about "a massive, systematic organizational scheme to steal opponents' signals and cheat ticket-holders of a contest played according to NFL rules."

The brief said that "such pervasive cheating has consistently given the Patriots an unfair, illegal advantage over its opponents and systematically deprived plaintiffs of the right to witness football matches played fairly as advertised and according to NFL rules, which is what plaintiffs contracted for."

The NFL hit Patriots coach Bill Belichick with a $500,000 fine and the team lost a first-round draft choice.

Now the 3rd Circuit has ruled that the NFL should be left to enforce its rules without any interference from the courts.

"It is not the role of judges and juries to be second-guessing the decision taken by a professional sports league purportedly enforcing its own rules. In fact, we generally lack the knowledge, experience, and tools in which to engage in such an inquiry," Cowen wrote.

The NFL was represented in the appeal by attorney Shepard Goldfein of Skadden Arps Slate Meagher & Flom. The Patriots and Belichick were represented by Daniel L. Goldberg of Bingham McCutchen in Boston.

Mayer and his lawyer, Bruce Afran, both worked for consumer advocate Ralph Nader earlier in their careers and consider "Spygate" a consumer-fraud case.

"It's a clear issue of consumer fraud. The mere fact that this is in the context of football doesn't mean that the people who pay to see the game have no rights," Afran told the Associated Press on Wednesday.

Many NFL ticket holders struggle to pay the high ticket price and deserve an honest game in return, he said.

The court's ruling, Afran said in the AP interview, "seems to suggest that no matter how much ticket holders pay, they can be defrauded by NFL teams. And it puts the NFL on the same level as professional wrestling."

NFL spokesman Greg Aiello declined to comment except to say the ruling speaks for itself.