"CBS’ public relations efforts to downplay the significance of the ruling are borderline laughable," maintains Wood, corresponding via email.
"The heart and soul of the defense strategy was clearly aimed at having these cases thrown out based on a finding that the comments were protected opinion," Wood adds. "If successful, that strategy would have prevented Burke from conducting discovery. Now the case will focus on the facts. The same facts and truth that exonerated Burke twenty years ago will exonerate him in this case. The facts surrounding the history, development and production of this fraudulent 'documentary-series' will be a stinging indictment of CBS."
In addition, Wood feels that Groner's finding is good news in regard to the future of yet another lawsuit against CBS, this one a $350 million demand filed by Burke's father, John Ramsey, in October 2017.

Dr. Werner Spitz, left, watches as a child is called upon to act out a theory of how Burke Ramsey could have killed his sister, JonBenét, from the CBS program The Case of: JonBenét Ramsey.
CBS via YouTube
Beyond CBS, the defendants named in the John Ramsey suit are Critical Content, the company that produced the docuseries, as well as Spitz, Jim Clemente, Laura Richards, Stanley Burke, James Fitzgerald, Henry Lee and James Kolar, who served as so-called investigators on the program. Kolar also wrote Foreign Faction, a book about the JonBenét slaying that the suit portrays as the blueprint for the show.
"CBS perpetrated a fraud upon the public," a passage from the complaint reads. "Instead of being a documentary based on a new and legitimate investigation by a team of qualified and unbiased experts, The Case of: JonBenét Ramsey was a fictional crime show based primarily on a preconceived storyline scripted in the self-published and commercially unsuccessful book Foreign Faction, written by Defendant James Kolar and self-published in 2012."
Another section maintains that "Defendants’ accusation that John covered-up that Burke killed JonBenét was not based on a complete investigation revealing truthful facts, new witnesses, new evidence or new theories. Instead, Defendants consciously built their Documentary on an illegitimate and unfounded investigation, false and omitted facts, old witnesses, old evidence and old theories."
Similar claims appear in the Burke Ramsey lawsuits, and Wood isn't surprised that they survived double-headed dismissal motions.

Burke Ramsey during a 2016 interview on the Dr. Phil program.
YouTube file photo
Groner's opinion increases the odds that CBS and Spitz will settle with Burke (and John) rather than take part in a trial that would presumably reveal the behind-the-scenes sausage-making involved in The Case of: JonBenét Ramsey and offer further insight into a tragic mystery that's remained fascinating to a significant portion of the public for more than two decades.
Wood, for his part, sees the latest development as "a flashing warning signal to other members of the media who seek to profit by relying on 'opinions' of guilt to create sensational story lines in unsolved cases of public interest."
In his view, "It is not the role of the media to determine guilt or innocence. It is the role of the media to discover and convey facts to the public. CBS knowingly crossed the line with Burke and it will ultimately pay a very heavy price for doing so. The rulings pave the way for justice for Burke and John and for accountability on the part of CBS for its intentional wrongdoing."