Opinion
June 8, 1992
Appeal from the Supreme Court, Suffolk County (Lama, J.).
Ordered that the order is affirmed, with costs.
The plaintiff maintains that his complaint stated a cause of action to recover damages for libel per se resulting from the defendant's dissemination of a letter addressed to his friends, neighbors, and fellow residents of the Village of Ocean Beach. In light of the plaintiff's failure to plead special damages, in order for the complaint to state an actionable claim, the allegations must sound in libel per se (see, Aronson v. Wiersma, 65 N.Y.2d 592, 594; see also, Rinaldi v. Holt, Rinehart Winston, 42 N.Y.2d 369, 380-381, cert denied 434 U.S. 969). However, a review of the letter as a whole reveals that it is not reasonably susceptible to a defamatory connotation (see, Silsdorf v Levine, 59 N.Y.2d 8, 12, cert denied 464 U.S. 831). Therefore, the complaint was properly dismissed (see generally, Steinhilber v Alphonse, 68 N.Y.2d 283, 290). Thompson, J.P., Lawrence, Copertino and Santucci, JJ., concur.