An employee at a Jewelry Store in Massachusetts has been ordered to pay thousands to a rival store owner. The employee has to pay up because of a negative review he published on Yelp. The jury concluded that the review was fake.
Adam Jacobs, who works for Toodie's Fine Jewelry in Quincy, will have to pay $34,500 to Stephen Blumberg. Blumberg owns Stephen Leigh Jewelers. The Ledger reported that Jacobs published a review on Yelp, and it was several paragraphs long.
A visit never occurred
In the fake review, Jacobs mentioned how he had a negative visit to the rival's store.
He said he wanted to buy an engagement ring and that he encouraged other reviewers on Yelp to go somewhere else. However, Blumberg's lawsuit claims that such a visit by Jacobs never occurred.
Blumberg, who was understandably upset, said Jacobs' review mentioned how he and his store were cold-blooded thieves. Blumberg denied he was a thief, He said he has never been convicted of anything in his entire life.
The review was up for months
The fake Yelp Review was published back in 2013. When Blumberg discovered the review, he filed a lawsuit against Toodie's Fine Jewelry and Jacobs, who is the son of the owner. Apparently, Jacobs was asked to take down the fake review, but he refused to take action.
Blumberg's attorney, Carl Goodman, said the Yelp review was up for about six months. Goodman stressed that bad reviews can have a negative impact on a business. He said that if people usually see bad reviews, then they consider going somewhere else. It did take a bit of work to track Jacobs down. Blumberg conducted an investigation of the Yelp review.
Eventually, he discovered it was Jacobs who wrote it. Goodman said Jacobs wrote reviews about other businesses, so they contacted those businesses and that's how they found out it was him behind the reviews.
When confronted, Jacobs admitted to writing the review. When he went to court, he tried to justify his actions to the jury.
Goodman said he thought it was offensive that Jacobs didn't apologize or offer to retract his statements.
Defendant doesn't agree with the decision
Jacobs does have an attorney. As of now, it's not clear if he plans on appealing the decision. However, his attorney did say they are considering filing an appeal.
Allan Levin, Jacobs' attorney, said they were disappointed with the decision. He said they don't agree with it and that the verdict wasn't based on facts. He added that they believed the verdict was made based on speculation.
