The woman who called police on a Black birdwatcher in Central Park, falsely claiming that he was stalking and threatening her in the call that the man recorded, lost the defamation suit she filed against her previous employer who fired her after the video went viral, the New York Post reports.
Amy Cooper, better known as “Central Park Karen,” approached birdwatcher Christian Cooper (no relation) and called the police claiming the man was threatening her and moving toward her even though Christian Cooper’s video showed him standing still and Amy Cooper acting eratically, including jerking her small dog around by its leash after Christian Cooper told her that dogs in Central Park needed to be on a leash.
Amy Cooper was fired by her employer, financial services firm Franklin Templeton, after the May 2020 confrontation. Amy Cooper claimed in her lawsuit that the company’s public statement about her firing perpetuated the disparaging characterization of her as “Central Park Karen.”
Amy Cooper was charged with making a false police report, but the charge was dropped after she completed court-mandated therapy.
“The contents of the viral video, as well as the dialogue surrounding it both in the media and on social media, were already matters of public knowledge,” rendering the defendants’ statements “inactionable as pure opinion,” US District Judge Ronnie Abrams wrote in his decision rejecting Amy Cooper’s case.