A defamation case brought by Cayuga Nation leaders Clint Halftown and Mark Lincoln against former employee Charles Bowman has ended nearly five years after it began. A stipulation of voluntary discontinuance filed Sept. 1 in State Supreme Court of Seneca County closed the case with prejudice, with neither side owing costs or fees.
Halftown and Lincoln filed the suit in January 2022 over comments Bowman posted on his personal Facebook page criticizing Halftown, the Nation’s leader, and Lincoln, then chief of the Nation’s police department, according to Finger Lakes Times. Bowman filed a counterclaim against the Nation, Halftown and Lincoln. Michael Nicholson of Rochester’s Barclay Damon represented Halftown and Lincoln; Michael Benson of Springville represented Bowman.
A 2020 Protest Sparked Years of Litigation
The case arose against the backdrop of a broader dispute over Cayuga Nation leadership. On Feb. 29, 2020, during a protest by a faction opposed to the Nation’s federally recognized leadership, Bowman was involved in a physical encounter with Cayuga Nation police on Route 89, in front of Nation property. The confrontation was followed by criminal proceedings as well as the civil defamation suit.
Federal recognition and other litigation
The leadership dispute also figures in a separate federal and state legal history. The U.S. Department of the Interior’s record says an Acting Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs issued a final agency decision on July 13, 2017, recognizing the Halftown Council as the Cayuga Nation’s legitimate government. In a 2023 decision, the department recounted a separate property-possession dispute: the New York Court of Appeals reversed a lower-court ruling in October 2019 concerning state courts’ authority amid the Nation’s leadership dispute. Those matters were distinct from Bowman’s defamation case, according to the U.S. Department of the Interior.
In May 2021, Bowman was charged with third-degree assault and third-degree criminal trespass in connection with another incident. The prosecutor’s information was filed by then-Seneca County District Attorney Mark Sinkiewicz. A Seneca Falls Town Court jury acquitted Bowman of assault but found him guilty of criminal trespass, according to the report.
Judge Let the Defamation Case Move Toward Trial
The civil case appeared headed toward trial after Seneca County Judge Barry Porsch denied the plaintiffs’ motion for summary judgment in March. Porsch found Bowman had pleaded sufficient facts to defeat the motion but did not decide whether his statements were protected under the New York Times Co. v. Sullivan standard, the Finger Lakes Times reported at the time.
Bowman initially represented himself and later retained a lawyer after a video conference with the judge and the plaintiffs’ attorneys. He told the Finger Lakes Times that negotiations continued for months before the parties agreed to discontinue the case.
Bowman Calls It a Free-Speech Fight, Halftown Calls It Mission Accomplished
Bowman described the suit as an attack on his First Amendment rights, saying he had expressed his opinion on his personal Facebook page.
In a statement responding to the discontinuance, Halftown said the statements at issue had stopped and had not resumed, and that the lawsuit had achieved its purpose. He also said the likelihood of collecting a monetary judgment from Bowman was low and that the Nation’s resources were better directed elsewhere. Lincoln retired from the Nation’s police force several years ago, Halftown said.
