A federal judge has ruled in favor of a Huntsville real estate agent in her libel suit against an Athens woman, records show.

On Sept. 16, 2015, Mollie Rosenblum anonymously posted a story about RE/MAX Alliance real estate agent Monika Glennon to the “She’s a Homewrecker” website.

“Ms. Rosenblum asserted that she and her husband hired Ms. Glennon to help with their search for a new home in the Huntsville area,” the documents show. “According to Ms. Rosenblum, when she arrived at a potential property, she found her husband inside the house engaging in sexual acts with Ms. Glennon.”

The story, which included graphic details of the alleged encounter, was shared multiple times and included the same photo of Glennon that appeared on her business cards and real estate signs. Along with the original story’s appearance on social media, other stories were posted. One version was posted to ReportMyEx.com and was written from the perspective of the husband.

Though the story was posted anonymously, Glennon and her legal team were eventually able to identify Rosenblum as the person behind the tale. However, it was not fully known why Rosenblum had posted the story to begin with.

“… She alludes to having read online posts by Ms. Glennon, which led Ms. Rosenblum to believe incorrectly that Ms. Glennon was anti-Semitic,” the documents state.

Glennon first filed a lawsuit in 2016, listing John Doe as a defendant. The amended suit against Rosenblum included claims of libel, invasion of privacy, copyright infringement, tortious interference with business relationships, tort of outrage and damages.

Rosenblum never appeared or otherwise defended herself, the court said, but she did file an affidavit in which she admitted the story was false. In fact, neither Rosenblum nor her husband had ever met or hired Glennon.

Furthermore, her husband was deceased at the time of the alleged encounter, records show.

“Sometime after posting the story, Ms. Rosenblum relented and contacted various websites where the story was posted in an unsuccessful attempt to have it removed,” records show. “The websites that continue to make the story available have informed both Ms. Glennon and Ms. Rosenblum that they will not de-index the story without a court order declaring the story to be false.”

This month’s ruling, more than two years after the initial suit was filed, will include just that.

“The Court has already concluded that Ms. Rosenblum’s story is defamatory. Therefore, the Court orders those whose websites still carrying Ms. Rosenblum’s story to remove it from their platforms. The Court also orders that search engines, such as Google, de-index the story to ensure that it does not appear as a search result when Ms. Glennon’s name is searched.”

The Court ruled in favor of Glennon on five of the six claims listed in her suit. The issue of damages was reserved for a later date, records show.

Not the first time

In addition to the defamatory story and its ensuing popularity, Rosenblum was charged with kidnapping on Oct. 12, 2016, after a man escaped her home in Athens and was found running along Market Street in his underwear.

The man told investigators he had been kidnapped and held inside a home on Patton Circle for more than 12 hours because of a financial dispute. Rosenblum was charged with first-degree kidnapping and second-degree assault.

Officials said the man was an acquaintance of Rosenblum’s and her co-conspirator, Wendell Todd Fain. Fain was also charged with first-degree kidnapping and second-degree assault in the October incident.

However, after Rosenblum posted her bond and was released later that same day, officers discovered she had held Fain captive for an unknown amount of time in August 2016.

Rosenblum was re-arrested Oct. 13 and charged with first-degree unlawful imprisonment, menacing and third-degree assault related to the August incident.

On the kidnapping charge, Rosenblum was sentenced Nov. 30, 2017, to 20 years in prison, but the sentence was split so that she will serve four years with the Limestone County Community Corrections Program and five years on supervised probation.

On the second-degree assault charge, she was sentenced to 10 years in state prison, but the sentence was suspended and she was ordered to serve three years on unsupervised probation. The two sentences were to be served concurrently.