Winegard v. Larsen

Sally Winegard (Sally) sued John Winegard (Winegard) (plaintiff) for dissolution of their marriage. Sally was represented by lawyers Richard Larsen, Stephen Schalk, and Robert Bradfield (the lawyers) (defendants). Winegard maintained there was no marriage. The dissolution court ruled that Sally and Winegard had a common-law marriage and summarized the parties’ testimony in its ruling. Attaching the ruling as an exhibit, Winegard sought but was denied permission to appeal to the Iowa Supreme Court. Various newspapers published articles attributing to Schalk statements about the marriage-dissolution action, including the fact that Sally and Winegard had held themselves out to the community as husband and wife and had the last name of Sally’s daughter from a previous marriage changed to Winegard. Winegard sued the lawyers for invasion of privacy. The court granted summary judgment to the lawyers, holding that an invasion-of-privacy claim could not be based on the Iowa statute providing for confidentiality of the record and evidence in marriage-dissolution actions, and even if it could, the statute’s protection was not available to Winegard because the alleged private facts were made public in Winegard’s federal-court filings and application to the supreme court for leave to appeal the dissolution court’s ruling. Winegard appealed.