Mr Cuti has filed a SLAPP lawsuit in Queens against artist Patrick Clark for criticizing Duane Reade...Cuti is acting like a bully and Patrick Clark has the NYCLU defending him. The new store in Rockaway may be boycotted by Clark's friends and neighbors.

The Newsday article is below. I'm going to personally check every Duane Reade NYC inspection report and will get back to you how Duane Reade is rated by the NYC Health Department, NYC Department of Consumer Affairs, etc.

Mr. Cuti is going to learn a lesson he'll never forget, and the same for DRD shareholders.

Duane Reade...Service with a Snarl and would-be Fuhrer. Tony...this is America.



By Merle English
Staff Writer

May 7, 2003, 5:53 PM EDT


Saying a lawsuit Duane Reade brought against a Rockaways artist is without merit, the New York Civil Liberties Union asked the pharmacy to withdraw it or face a vigorous defense.

In a May 5 letter to attorneys for Duane Reade, Christopher Dunn, the NYCLU's associate legal director, said the suit "appears to be little more than an effort to intimidate Mr. Clark and to punish him for engaging in entirely protected advocacy."

Patrick Clark, a stained glass artist, placed an advertisement in The Wave, a community newspaper, criticizing a 32-by-20-foot frame for an illuminated rooftop sign planned for a new Duane Reade pharmacy in Rockaway Park. The Wave also was named in the suit.

Clark fears the sign would detract from a domed, stained-glass work he is creating as part of a monument to 70 Rockaways residents who died in the World Trade Center terrorist attack. The sign would overlook a "Tribute Park" on Jamaica Bay adjacent to the new pharmacy where the artist's work will be installed.

In the March 29 ad, Clark called the proposed sign "an aesthetic nightmare" and said residents should boycott the store if it goes up.

Dunn said in his letter that Clark's statements in the ad, which were labeled as "personal opinion," "are plainly opinion, which is not actionable under New York and federal law. We therefore call upon your client to withdraw the suit immediately." He said if it wasn't promptly withdrawn, "we will defend it vigorously as well as consider affirmative remedies Mr. Clark may have available to him."

The pharmacy refused to comment beyond a statement it issued this month, saying that Duane Reade "has no desire to inhibit legitimate free speech," but that Clark's statements were "false and defamatory."

Some community leaders also have said the pharmacy should drop the lawsuit.


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