The Hill family had sued after Life implied in a blurb that the upcoming film adaptation of The Desperate Hours was based on the real-life incident where they were held hostage in their home by escaped convicts.

[5] In 1954, the Broadway theatre production of the play The Desperate Hours debuted, which depicted a hostage incident similar to that experienced by the Hill family.

[2][3] However, in The Desperate Hours, the scenario was changed from the Hills' actual experiences, to a fictional portrayal of a family victimized by threats of sexual abuse and other violent acts.

[2] Life magazine published an article on the debut of The Desperate Hours on Broadway, and included pictures of the actors in the prior residence of the Hills in the Whitemarsh suburb of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

In his opening argument, he asserted that the privacy law in question in New York was unconstitutional, due to its broadness and for punitively impacting the press for publishing factual information.

[7] As a secondary argument, Medina put forth the notion that the prior ruling in the case was inappropriate because the jury was allowed to determine liability of Life based on the inaccuracy of the article, while neglecting to take into account whether or not the act by the magazine was reckless or willful.

[8] He put forth the potential for a lawsuit against the press for a simple unintentional error, "It comes down to if you treat it on a mistake basis, on truth or falsity, what has happened to the law of libel?

[9] In his 1985 book The Unpublished Opinions of the Warren Court, author Bernard Schwartz revealed that an initial conference had resulted in votes of 6 to 3 to affirm the judgment in favor of the Hill family.

[11][6][10] After the 1985 publication of Schwartz's book revealed the initial draft opinion of the Court in the case,[6][10] former President Richard Nixon requested his prior White House Counsel Leonard Garment to investigate the matter.

"[13][14] Garment emphasized a comment from the dissent opinion written by Justice Harlan, which warned undesired media attention imparted "severe risk of irremediable harm ... [to] individuals exposed to it and powerless to protect themselves against it.

"[15] Justice Black emphasized that though the media makes mistakes at times in its reporting, requiring press organizations to pay out for claims which were not libel related to inaccuracies which did not hurt individuals' reputation, would engender a situation of self-censorship.

[17] Medina requested the Court declare the privacy law in question unconstitutional, because, "[i]n this field of privacy, I merely suggest that when it is nondefamatory and when you are talking about a public fact, we should have the protection that the fellow who comes in to sue us must prove both falsity and knowledge of falsity, or recklessness, and that this is a minimum, because, mind you, this article here, the dissent in the appellate division, found it was an informative presentation of legitimate news.

[17] Medina concluded the reargument period by emphasizing his view that in case it was determined by the Court that evidence showed the Life magazine staff was aware of the inaccuracy of the article in question, this lack of jury instruction was crucial.

[17] Medina said that due to this failure to inform the jury of a requirement to find willful inaccuracy on the part of Life magazine, "I still think I am entitled to win.

[4] This decision had the impact of elaborating on the "actual malice" standard of the Court's prior holding in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, to also include cases involving false light.

[12] In his book Freedom for the Thought That We Hate: A Biography of the First Amendment, author Anthony Lewis examined the case, and noted, "Using someone's likeness without permission has developed as one of the four branches of privacy law.