Courtney Love breaks down in court over Nirvana’s legacy
Courtney Love broke down in tears in court earlier today (January 22), upon hearing businessman Phillip Gross discuss Nirvana’s legacy. Love is currently appearing in court to defend an allegedly defamatory tweet she wrote in 2010. The Hole frontwoman is being pursued by Rhonda Holmes, a lawyer she hired previously to handle a fraud case against those managing the estate of her late husband Kurt Cobain.
On what is the fourth day of the case, Love began to cry when Gross discussed another lawsuit that he had bought up against a guitar tech who claimed to have a large collection of Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain’s guitars, reports Spin. Spin writes that Love “covered her face with her hands, audibly gasped, and began to sob”.
Holmes is suing Love over a 2010 tweet that read in part: “I was fucking devestated [sic] when Rhonda J. Holmes esq. of san diego was bought off.” She is also facing claims in relation to a follow-up interview she gave after sending the tweet.
It is the first time a celebrity has been called to defend an allegedly defamatory tweet in a US courtroom. The jury must first decide whether Love’s Twitter followers would have reasonably understood the statement to have been about Holmes and her law firm. It must also decide whether Love intended to send the tweet, which she claims was meant to be a direct message, but was accidentally made public. If she pursues this defense, wider questions will be asked about her general behavior.
Finally, if Holmes is successful in her legal action by showing the tweet was reasonably understood to communicate an untruth about the lawyer taking a bribe, the court must decide on the amount of damages to be awarded to her.
Source: NME