A Newton jeweler is taking a Yelper to court
The business owner thinks the user’s review was defamatory.
The Internet rejoiced with collective schadenfreude when, earlier this year, Alden & Harlow owner Michael Scelfo publicly put two “entitled’’ customers in their place. The customers threatened to leave bad Yelp reviews if they didn’t receive great service, but Scelfo wrote a lengthy Instagram post ending with #wedontnegotiatewithyelpers.
But one business owner has to, and is even facing his negative-reviewer in court.
When Linda G. left a one-star review on the Newton jewelry store Pageo’s Yelp page, Pageo’s owner George Pelz demanded the review be removed. When the review remained, Pelz called Linda a “Yelp Terrorist.’’
In July, Pelz filed a lawsuit against Linda for libel and defamation.
Linda’s review said that this wasn’t her first interaction with Pelz. According to her review, written in February, they had some history:
Run! Way overpriced, but worse than that is the ethics or LACK THEREOF!!
My husband, myself and some friends of ours were loyal customers of Pageo Newton, Nantucket and Boston. Together we spent 100s of thousands of dollars on some gorgeous but definitely way overpriced jewelry. It would be cheaper to fly to Italy, get a villa and buy it yourself!
The reason why am writing today is that at one point I was in a very desperate situation and I sold my diamond ring to George my wedding ring/engagement ring. I was in abusive relationship and was very very desperate. I thought I could trust him since I had given him so much business , but basically gave me not even near one 10th of what it was worth, but I was so desperate I took it so I could find a place to live and get away from my abusive husband who controlled all of our assets… George took all the jewelry that I had ever bought there and gave me peanuts for it!!
In March, Pelz responded:
You are a Yelp Terrorist. How do you respond to a complete fabrication? There is not a single word of truth in the Linda G. post. This “story’’ is complete fiction…
I was advised by yelp to not publicly respond to this post and to “Flag’’ it. They would deal with it within 5 business days. They have not.
Yelp itself isn’t being sued, but is being subpoenaed for Linda’s full name and address. Yelp objected, saying that violates the poster’s First Amendment right to speak anonymously. According to Public Citizen’s Paul Levy, who is representing Yelp, Massachusetts courts lack jurisdiction to subpoena the information from Yelp because the company’s headquarters are in California.
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