On Sept. 13, 2016, at 2:27 p.m. ET, CNN Money reported about a defamation lawsuit worth $12 million that Virginia-based gun rights activist group, Virginia Citizens Defense League (VCDL) filed.
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VCDL president Philip Van Cleave said, “We were horrified to see how Couric and her team manipulated us and the video footage to make us look like fools who didn’t stand up for the Second Amendment. You shouldn’t intentionally misrepresent someone’s views just because you disagree with them”.
The director inserted eight seconds of dead air in the film “Under the Gun” after Couric asked members of the Virginia Citizens Defense League (VCDL) how guns could be kept out of the hands of felons or terrorists without background checks.
Activists can be heard on audio of the exchange responding to Couric’s question nearly immediately.
A gun rights group claims filmmakers used ominous lighting and deceptive editing to cast them as inept.
Couric expressed regrets not showing the VCDL answer, but she has not yet released a statement about the lawsuit. “The statements from Soechtig and Couric will surely intensify the backlash, as well they should”, wrote the Washington Post’s Erik Wemple in a column cited, alongside similar criticism from NPR’s media reporter David Folkenflik, in the lawsuit.
But, judging by her decision to allow blatantly misleading, unethical edits make their way to the final film, I am not surprised that Ms. Couric let her anti-gun agenda get in the way of the truth.
Van Cleave said the note appended to the movie’s website is also inadequate.
“They manipulated the footage to manufacture a fictional exchange that never happened”, she said.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court (United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia- Richmond Division), seeks $12 million in compensatory damages, plus punitive damages.
The famous news anchor Katie Couric provides the narrating voice for the film, which premiered earlier this year at the Sundance Film Festival.
The edit was exposed by a blogger.
Couric and Soechtig did not respond to request for comment from Deadline on the lawsuit.
VCDL and Bearing Arms also allege that Couric, Soechtig and the film’s producers committed felonies by illegally purchasing guns from a private seller in Arizona, in order to prove the ease of doing so.
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A spokesperson for Epix told Deadline the lawsuit is “completely without merit”. EPIX saw the Sundance screening and acquired the documentary at that time.
