Elon Musk, founder of a rocket ship company and CEO of a rising automobile company/cult, left a federal courtroom on Friday more emboldened than ever to say whatever he wants. A unanimous verdict handed down by the jury declared that calling an unknown British diver “pedo guy” on Twitter did not constitute defamation, thus allowing Musk, who has 30 million followers on the social media platform, to sidestep $190 million in damages.
“My faith in humanity is restored,” said Musk, who also called diver Vernon Unsworth a “child rapist” with no corroborating evidence in an email to a Buzzfeed reporter, upon leaving the courthouse.
Musk’s defence team, headed up by attorney Alex Spiro, argued successfully that their client was merely lashing out in anger at a man who helped orchestrate the successful rescue of a trapped children’s soccer team from a flooded Thai cave. Calling someone you’ve never met “pedo guy” on a public stage was just a meaningless slur, they claimed, rather than an accusation.
The jury agreed that Musk, who uttered the slur after Unsworth told him to stick his home-built submarine — deemed wholly insufficient for the task of rescuing the kids — up his own ass, did not deserve to face punishment for his actions.
