Man sues dentist, City of Nitro for defamation

WINFIELD – A man is suing a dental office and the City of Nitro after he claims he was defamed and a false complaint was filed against him.

The Chief of Police in Nitro, Jack Jordan, was also named as a defendant in the suit.

On Oct. 28, 2009, Charles Cobb presented to Dr. Robert L. Kardos' dental office in Nitro with a set of broken and defective dentures and requested a new set, pursuant to a verbal five-year warranty, according to a complaint filed Aug. 31 in Putnam Circuit Court.

Cobb claims Kardos advised that he would not replace the dentures and that they were not broken or defective, to which he replied that he would file suit to enforce Kardos' warranty if it was not honored.

Later that day, Cobb filed a complaint against Kardos, alleging that he failed to honor the warranty on the set of broken dentures, according to the suit.

Cobb claims Kardos "authored a letter to the plaintiff wherein he alleged that the plaintiff had engaged in 'hostile actions and behavior in my office reception area...'" Cobb claims the letter also stated that Kardos had filed an incident report with Jordan and the Nitro Police Department.

Nitro Police Officer J.E. Mace was assigned to investigate the factual circumstances underlying the incident reporter filed by Kardos, according to the suit.

Cobb claims Mace was unable to corroborate the contention of Kardos that Cobb had thrown a set of dentures at him. Mace's investigation also revealed that an employee of Kardos did not witness any hostile and threatening acts described in Kardos in the incident report.

On March 2, 2010, the criminal charges filed against Cobb were dismissed without prejudice by a Kanawha County magistrate, according to the suit.

Cobb claims the defendants caused him to suffer emotional distress through their retaliatory, intimidating, defamatory and slanderous conduct.

Kardos breached his duties to Cobb by filing the false report against him, according to the suit.

Cobb claims Jordan's conduct was "atrocious, intolerable, and so extreme and outrageous as to exceed the bounds of decency and was intolerable to a civil society."

Cobb is seeking compensatory and punitive damages. He is being represented by Jon D. Hoover.

The case has been assigned to Circuit Judge O.C. Spaulding.

Putnam Circuit Court case number: 11-C-246