In my experience, attorneys often include inflammatory, defamatory statements in Complaints and Answers - not for the purpose of pleading their claims or defenses, but as part of their client's PR strategy. The lawyer and the PR team later quote the pleading and assume they are insulated from defamation liability under the judicial proceedings privilege.
The Texas Supreme Court held otherwise this week, noting that the judicial proceedings privilege in Texas only protected the statements made in Court, and did not extend to quotations of those statements made to the press.
This privilege is broader in other states. It's worth a moment of research, on consultation with a First Amendment attorney, before developing a press strategy based on defamatory statements contained within pleadings.
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