Yale Online Slur Lawsuit Settled

A lawyer for two former Yale University law students says they have settled their lawsuit against several people they accused of posting sexually harassing and threatening messages about them on an Internet site.

San Francisco attorney Ashok Ramani told The Hartford Courant on Wednesday that the two women settled with “a handful of folks” out of the more than 30 anonymous authors they sued and the case is over. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Heide Iravani and Brittan Heller, who have since graduated, sued the message writers in U.S. District Court in Hartford, seeking at least $245,000 in punitive damages as well as legal expenses.

The lawsuit was over crude comments about them posted on AutoAdmit, a Web message board site frequented by college students.