In this libel action against a publisher of a national magazine, we are' called upon again to apply the principles of New York Times Company v. Sullivan1 and its progeny, to determine if the constitutional guarantees of the First and Fourteenth Amendments confer immunity from claims for damages, under the facts and circumstances of the case.
Mary Alice Firestone filed this Florida diversity suit for compensatory and punitive damages based on alleged libel and invasion of privacy against Time, Inc., growing out of the publication of an article in Life Magazine, owned by defendant. The matter is before us for the second time. (See Firestone v. Time, Inc., 5 Cir., 1969, 414 F.2d 790, for our prior opinion.) When this case was first appealed, Mrs. Firestone’s complaint had been dismissed by the District Court on motion to dismiss. However, we reversed and remanded for further disposition, since it did not appear to a certainty that plaintiff would be entitled to no relief under any set of facts which could be proved in support of her claim. Id., 414 F.2d 790.2 See also Arthur H. *714Richland Company v. Harper, 5 Cir., 1962, 302 F.2d 324, 325; Shell v. Hensley, 5 Cir., 1970, 430 F.2d 819, 826; Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-46, 78 S.Ct. 99, 101-102, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957).
The publication complained of appeared in Life Magazine on May 20, 1966, in a lengthy feature story about electronic eavesdropping. Highlighted on the cover of the magazine the article was entitled “THE BIG SNOOP,” “Electronic Snooping Insidious Invasion of Privacy.” The cover showed a young lady partially undraped with a tiny transmitter taped to her back where her dress in place would conceal it. On the first page of the article was a photograph of a “bugged martini” with a plastic olive containing a built-in sending device and toothpick antenna which it was said could transmit a cocktail party conversation 100 feet. The article referred to eavesdropping as a “multimillion dollar industry”; and said that bugging is “shockingly widespread” and “increasingly insidious.” In ten full pages “LIFE reveals in detail this electronic assault on privacy . . . . ” There are photographs and text pertaining to all types of electronic eavesdropping devices and “bugs.” On one page of the story a photograph is captioned “Divorce Spy.” Pictured is Jack Harwood of Palm Beach, Florida, apparently the “divorce spy”. Immediately beneath his photograph is another of Russell Firestone and his estranged wife Mary Alice Firestone, plaintiff in this case. The magazine’s text concerning the photographs of Harwood and Russell and Mary Alice Firestone is the specific subject matter of this suit and reads as follows:
“TWO-WAY SNOOP. In Florida, where electronic eavesdropping is frequently employed in divorce suits, private eyes like Jack Harwood of Palm Beach, shown above with some of his gear, do a thriving business. Harwood, who boasts, T’m a fantastic wire man,’ was hired by tire heir Russell Firestone to keep tabs on his estranged wife, Mary Alice. She in turn got one of Harwood’s assistants to sell out and work for her and, says Harwood, ‘He plays just as rough with the bugs as I do.’ A court recently ordered Russell and Mary Alice to stop spying on each other.”
The Firestones were then engaged in marital litigation in a Florida State Court. The record discloses that the Harwood assistant referred to and about which there is considerable testimony was one Carl Geisler.
The two-count amended complaint alleged that the Life Magazine article defamed plaintiff where it stated, “She in turn got one of Harwood’s assistants to sell out and work for her . . . .” ; that plaintiff has enjoyed an unblemished reputation but, as a result of the defamatory article, has been severely injured in her personal relations and has suffered severe damage to her reputation in the community; that defendant well knew that the employee [Geisler] said to have sold out to work for plaintiff was a private investigator who was to become a witness in the divorce action and whose credibility was severely damaged by the publication; that the defamatory words were intended to convey the meaning that plaintiff would incite Harwood’s employee to commit perjury in violation of Florida Statutes, FSA § 837.04,3 thus accusing plaintiff of committing a felony; that plaintiff’s position in the court where the marital litigation is pending has been irreparably damaged by the article; that the publi*715cation has invaded the privacy of plaintiff’s personal affairs causing her to become subject to disgrace and humiliation ; that her private activities and her private divorce litigation were not matters of public concern or interest; that the defamatory language in the publication was false, to the knowledge of defendant, and was made with reckless and utter disregard for its truth or falsity, and with malice toward plaintiff. Defendant denied the allegations of the complaint and averred that the publication complained of was true, consisted of reports on matters of public interest, was made in good faith, pursuant to its duty to inform the public; that the publication was made without malice in a national news magazine of general circulation and is privileged and protected by the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the Constitution of the United States.
The case was tried before the District Judge, sitting without a jury, and resulted in judgment in favor of plaintiff for $15,000 compensatory damages and $15,000 additional punitive damages. Both parties have appealed, defendant contending that suit should have been dismissed in its entirety and plaintiff asserting that the award of punitive damages was inadequate.
The District Judge in written findings of fact and conclusions of law reviewed Florida jurisprudence relative to actions for libel under the law of that state.4 He held that when Life’s article stated that plaintiff caused one of Harwood’s assistants [Geisler] to sell out to her, it necessarily charged that she paid him to betray her husband in a marital dispute between them, and that she had caused him to transfer his allegiance and confidentially obtained knowledge to her — in fact, that she “bribed” Harwood’s assistant; that the article was actionable per se and libelous. He further held that the article was not constitutionally protected under the doctrine of New York Times Company v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. 254, 84 S.Ct. 710, 11 L.Ed.2d 686 (1964), because plaintiff was not of the class of persons referred to in that decision nor a public character and “[h]er private affairs were not a matter of legitimate public concern.” 5 However, the District Judge made alternative findings and conclusions to the effect that even if New York Times were applicable plaintiff had sustained the burden of proof and was entitled to recovery. He held that Life’s editorial staff “necessarily had a high degree of awareness of the probable falsity of the statements” at*716tributed to Harwood relative to a “sell out,” and that the conclusion was “inescapable” that the complained of words “sell out” were written “with reckless and wanton disregard for the truth and necessarily with serious doubts as to the truth” thereof. In his view, plaintiff suffered personal and public humiliation and her reputation was injured. In summary, the Court held that defendant had “falsely libeled” plaintiff, thus entitling her to compensatory and punitive damages.6 However, the Trial Court held that plaintiff had no action for invasion of privacy because she had given “limited consent” to publication.7
Our review of this case is written with the principles of the recent decision of the Supreme Court in Rosenbloom v. Metromedia, Inc., 403 U.S. 29, 91 S.Ct. 1811, 29 L.Ed.2d 296 (1971), squarely before us. In Metromedia, the Supreme Court reached a new dimension under the First Amendment constitutional protection for freedom of speech and of the press. No longer did the constitutional guarantee apply only to suits of public figures or public officials but in a sweeping decision the plurality opinion of the Court (by Justice Brennan) extended “constitutional protection to all discussion and communication involving matters of public or general concern, without regard to whether the persons involved are famous or anonymous.” Id., 403 U.S. at 44, 91 S.Ct. at 1820.
The holding in Metromedia was anticipated by this Circuit in several prior decisions beginning with Time, Inc. v. McLaney, 5 Cir., 1969, 406 F.2d 565, cert. denied, 395 U.S. 922, 89 S.Ct. 1776, 23 L.Ed.2d 239 (1962), where we held that “the constitutional privilege extends to discussions by specific individuals, not associated with any government, if those individuals are involved in matters of important public concern.” 406 F.2d at 573. Next, in Bon Air Hotel, Inc. v. Time, Inc., 5 Cir., 1970, 426 F.2d 858, we said, “This Court in Time, Inc. v. McLaney . . . noted that the New York Times actual malice standard is applicable to publications involving matters of great public interest.” 426 F.2d at 861. Then in Time, Inc. v. Ragano, 5 Cir., 1970, 427 F.2d 219, we reaffirmed the applicability of the New York Times standard requiring actual malice where the alleged defamatory article concerned a matter of great public interest, a statement being made with actual malice if made “with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.” 427 F.2d at 221; New York Times Company v. Sullivan, 376 U.S. at 280, 84 S.Ct. at 726. In Dacey v. Florida Bar, Inc., 5 Cir., 1970, 427 F.2d 1292, we said again, *717“that the First Amendment privilege extends to discussions of specific individuals, not associated with any government, if those individuals are involved in matters of important public concern.” 427 F.2d at 1295.8
Thus, somewhat prior to Metromedia, the Fifth Circuit was already firmly on record, as the above decisions illustrate, as holding that the constitutional privilege in favor of a publisher extends to publications relating to specific individuals, whether public figures or not, if those individuals are involved in matters of “important public concern,” or “of great public interest,” or “of important public concern.”
As now expressed by the Supreme Court in Metromedia, 403 U.S. at 44, 91 S.Ct. at 1820, “It is clear that there has emerged from our cases decided since New York Times the concept that the First Amendment’s impact upon state libel laws derives not so much from whether the plaintiff is a ‘public official,’ ‘public figure,’ or ‘private individual,’ as it derives from the question whether the allegedly defamatory publication concerns a matter of public or general interest.”
It cannot be doubted that electronic eavesdropping is a matter of general public concern. Apparently the Trial Judge thought so in this case.9 We construe the briefs and arguments of the parties to concede as much. However, plaintiff contends that though the Life Magazine article on electronic eavesdropping may be an article on a subject of general public interest and concern, it does not confer an unlimited privilege on the magazine to discuss the private, personal and marital difficulties of plaintiff, and more particularly does not authorize the use of false and defamatory matter known to be false or with serious doubts as to its truthfulness.
In our view the complained of text of the Life Magazine article under the caption “TWO-WAY SNOOP” is directly related to the central theme of the story. It states that electronic eavesdropping is frequently employed in divorce suits. A photograph of Harwood, a person who apparently specializes in the use of such equipment, is likewise so related. Whether Life was justified in stating in the caption that plaintiff Mary Alice Firestone “got one of Harwood’s assistants to sell out and work for her” must be measured against the New York Times standard of knowing or reckless falsehood. As a reviewing court, we “cannot avoid making an independent constitutional judgment” on the facts of the case. Metromedia, 403 U.S. at 54, 91 S.Ct. at 1825; Jacobellis v. Ohio, 378 U.S. 184, 190, 84 S.Ct. 1676, 1679, 12 L.Ed.2d 793 (1964).10 “The simple fact is that First Amendment questions of ‘constitutional fact’ compel *718this Court’s de novo review.”11 Metromedia, 403 U.S. at 54, 91 S.Ct. at 1825.12 Though civil litigation is ordinarily decided by the preponderance of the evidence, that standard along with the reasonable man standard of liability are rejected by the Supreme Court, as being inconsistent with the First Amendment. Metromedia, 403 U.S. at 50, 91 S.Ct. at 1823. A negligence standard “gives insufficient breathing space to First Amendment values,” Metromedia, 403 U.S. at 52, 91 S.Ct. at 1824; “[a] negligence test would place on the press the intolerable burden of guessing how a jury might assess the reasonableness of steps taken by it to verify the accuracy of every reference to a name, picture or portrait.” Time, Inc. v. Hill, 385 U.S. 374, 389, 87 S.Ct. 534, 543, 17 L.Ed.2d 456 (1967). “ . . . our ‘cases are clear that reckless conduct is not measured by whether a reasonably prudent man would have published, or would have investigated before publishing. There must be sufficient evidence to permit the conclusion that the defendant in fact entertained serious doubts as to the truth of his publication.’ St. Amant v. Thompson, 390 U.S., [727] at 731, 88 S.Ct. [1323] at 1325 [20 L.Ed.2d 262].” Metromedia, 403 U.S. at 56, 91 S.Ct. at 1826. In this libel action the judgment in favor of plaintiff, a private individual, against the publisher of a national magazine “relating to [her] involvement in an event of public or general concern may be sustained only upon clear and convincing proof that the defamatory falsehood was published with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.” Metromedia, 403 U.S. at 52, 91 S.Ct. at 1824.
We have already determined that the Life Magazine article was on a matter of general public interest and that the part of the text relating to the Firestone marital difficulties and electronic eavesdropping employed in connection with the divorce action were germane to the article’s principal theme and subject matter.
In our own independent de novo review of the facts of this case and in our search for the clear and convincing proof in the record which is required to sustain a judgment for plaintiff, we have examined the evidence to determine whether the magazine article was published with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not. Having done so we reach an opposite conclusion from that of the District Court. Clear and convincing proof greater than a preponderance is simply not to be found in the record. We suspect, for reasons we shall point out, that the Trial Judge used a negligence standard (or failure to use reasonable care) in determining that defendant was liable. Employing such a standard is obvious error when we consider the Supreme Court’s recent decisions involving freedom of the press as guaranteed by the First Amendment. Likewise, it should be remembered that since our review of the facts of the case is de novo, we are not bound by the findings of the District Court. Time, Inc. v. Pape, 401 U.S. 279, 284, 91 S.Ct. 633, 636-637, 28 L.Ed.2d 45 (1971).13 It is at *719once apparent that the scope of review in First Amendment libel cases is the broadest possible under the law. The Supreme Court has fashioned such broad review because our early history and expressions by our founding fathers, such as Madison, indicate that liberty of the press is considered “sacred” in America, and that our free society is dependent for its survival upon a vigorous free press.14 The immunity conferred by the First Amendment in favor of a publication is therefore designed more for the protection of the public generally than it is for the publisher himself.
The facts show that when Life began assembling the materials for this article it sent David Chandler to Florida to make an investigation as a reporter into the use of electronic eavesdropping devices in connection with sensational divorce actions in that area. Chandler had originally been employed by Life in 1964 and had been working for the magazine for nearly four years at the time. His immediate superior, Richard Billings, considered him a reliable reporter based on his past experience with him in work he had done for the magazine. It was Chandler who provided the facts for Billings and Life’s editorial staff which formed the basis of the caption in the article pertaining to plaintiff getting one of Harwood’s assistants to “sell out” and work for her. The assistant referred to was Carl Geisler. It is undisputed that Geisler worked for Harwood in his private detective business at a time when Harwood was employed by plaintiff’s husband Russell Firestone in surveillance of Mrs. Firestone, plaintiff herein. The evidence is conclusive that later Geisler wound up on plaintiff’s side of the divorce controversy and was seen several times in her company. Chandler secured his information about the controversial “sell out” from Harwood and at the trial of this case Harwood testified that he had indeed told Chandler that Geisler, a former private investigator employed by him, was then working on the other side but Harwood said that he had told Chandler the information had come to him from anonymous phone calls.15 He testified that he *720told Chandler that he had suspicions that while Geisler was still employed by him he was friendly with Mrs. Firestone's side in the divorce controversy. Harwood added that Geisler “had been acting very strange.”
The information concerning the “sell out” was telegraphed by Chandler to Life Magazine at New York, attention of Billings.16
The District Judge in analyzing the testimony found that Billings and others *721on Life’s editorial staff “had no other information [than Chandler’s] and sought none, and they necessarily had a high degree of awareness of the probable falsity of the statement.” The District Judge’s opinion tends to show that he employed a negligence standard in assessing the evidence against defendant, which is an erroneous and improper standard, as we have previously indicated. The Trial Judge’s statement that “[t]he conclusion is inescapable that [Billings] and others who worked on the caption had serious doubts as to the truth of the article in its published form” is at odds with the evidence which we have scrutinized to find the clear and convincing proof of knowing or reckless falsehood requisite in this case.17 The circumstance of Geisler working for Harwood who was employed by Mr. Firestone, and later working for Mrs. Firestone, plaintiff herein, in the same marital litigation has not been explained by plaintiff or her witnesses. Whether or not she procured the “sell out” or Geisler changed sides for some other reason is a matter of conjecture, but a resolution of that question is not necessary to our decision here.
Billings and Life’s editorial staff had a right under the circumstances to rely on Chandler, who relied on Harwood. There is no evidence in the record which would justify the conclusion that Life knew its caption in the article relating to Mrs. Firestone was untrue or that the editorial staff entertained serious doubts about its truthfulness sufficient to amount to recklessness. Though the Trial Judge so found he did not support his finding with evidentiary facts. We have determined in our own independent de novo review of this case that the District Judge decided the ease by employing erroneous legal standards and his conclusions are not supported by the record. Under New York Times and its progeny, especially Metromedia, and the prior decisions of this Court, plaintiff cannot recover under the circumstances presented here.
Reversed.