The ruling stems from a 2023 defamation lawsuit by University of Alabama basketball player Kai Spears against The Times, which incorrectly identified him as being present during a January 2023 shooting that killed Jamea Harris. The case attracted national attention because three Alabama basketball players were allegedly involved in the shooting, including player Darius Miles and star Brandon Miller, who allegedly brought the murder weapon to the scene at Miles's request. Spears sued after The Times published an article based on confidential sources wrongly placing him in Miller's car during the shooting.
Writing for the court, Justice Scott McCool emphasized that Alabama Code Section 12-21-142, enacted in 1935, must be 'strictly and narrowly' construed because it modifies common law principles favoring disclosure. 'By its plain language, § 12-21-142 protects only 'sources of … information,' which, in its strictest and narrowest sense, does not protect 'any and all information' that, in the hands of a resourceful recipient, 'could reasonably lead' to the discovery of the identity of a confidential source,' McCool wrote for the unanimous court.
The court delivered its strongest language when contrasting Alabama's law with broader shield statutes in other states, noting that 'if the Legislature had wanted § 12-21-142 to provide such broad protection, it knew how to draft a statute to reach that end.' McCool pointed to Delaware's shield statute protecting information that 'would substantially increase the likelihood' of source discovery and Hawaii's law covering information that 'could reasonably be expected to lead to the discovery of the identity of the source' as examples of broader legislative drafting.
The case reached the Alabama Supreme Court through certified questions from U.S. District Judge Annemarie Carney Axon in the Northern District of Alabama, who sought guidance on whether the shield law applies to online publications and whether it protects all information that could lead to source identification. The federal court's involvement began after Spears sought discovery from The Times about its confidential sources, arguing the newspaper 'failed to use reasonable care in publishing and disseminating untrue statements' despite 'harboring serious doubts as to the reliability of its source.'
The Times had argued for broad protection, contending that 'the privilege would be meaningless if it did not protect contact information, personal data, or descriptive details that, individually or in combination, would narrow the pool of potential sources to the point where their identity could be discerned.' The court rejected this reasoning, explaining that such an interpretation would 'risk creating protection for information that the statute, on its face, does not protect.' McCool noted that information which could lead to source discovery 'will not necessarily do so.'
Justice Mendheim dissented, criticizing the majority's decision to decline answering the first certified question about online publication while proceeding to answer the second question that was expressly conditional on affirming the first. 'Judge Axon did not unconditionally certify the second question to this Court,' Mendheim wrote, arguing the court 'expresses disagreement with Judge Axon's decisions as to waiver issues she has not certified.' Justice Shaw filed a separate concurrence, agreeing with the result but preferring a different analytical approach.
The ruling creates a narrower interpretation of reporter's privilege in Alabama compared to jurisdictions like Pennsylvania and California, where courts have broadly construed similar statutes to protect any information that 'could' or 'may' lead to source identification. The court explicitly rejected following those precedents, noting that those jurisdictions 'interpret their respective shield statutes liberally and broadly, whereas we are interpreting § 12-21-142 strictly and narrowly.'
For media lawyers, the decision establishes that Alabama's shield law will protect source-identifying information like residential addresses, phone numbers, and email accounts that would 'inevitably' reveal identity, but not broader categories of information that might merely point toward a source's identity. The court emphasized that trial courts must make fact-specific determinations about whether particular information meets the 'inevitable disclosure' standard, with the burden on the media outlet to prove protection applies.