- A New Jersey appellate court has reinstated a lawsuit charging that Jayson Williams and his lawyers slandered a state trooper who investigated the fatal shooting at the retired New Jersey Nets player's star's mansion.

The three-judge panel ruled Wednesday that Trooper James Kiernan, who did not testify in Williams' manslaughter trial, was entitled to have complaints in his defamation lawsuit considered true before any dismissal, finding that a judge failed to give him the required benefit of the doubt when tossing the lawsuit in May 2004.

The trooper's lawsuit stemmed from a review of trooper service records by Williams' lawyers in an effort to find evidence of bias.

Williams' lawyers cited a 1989 traffic stop that led to Kiernan's being suspended for a year. The lawyers said Kiernan was accused of abusing an Orthodox rabbi and his female passenger, but the appellate decision said that was wrong.