Obviously, I can’t speak for HP; but just for purposes of discussion… Sometimes it may not even matter whether the person making the complaint is “legitimate” or a “nut-job”.
If the reason given to you didn't specify whether or not HP just took the individual's word for it (that your Hub had "iffy-ness" in it), did you e.mail staff and ask whether they just took the other person's word for it or else a) did checking into the facts, or b) were just able to recognize "iffy-ness" when they see it?
For example (and an extreme one), if I (without legal background and/or without working at "X" company) were to see a Hub that said that ABC Toy Company recommended marbles for two-year-olds, I might flag that Hub, have HP people at it, and think, "Everyone knows that marbles are not recommended for two-year-olds." Staff wouldn't need to know whether I have x credentials/expertise in any number of related areas (child care, child health, legal issues, statistics on marble choking, etc. etc.) It's just an "everyone-knows-that" kind of thing. In some cases, they probably don't need to know the qualifications of the person complaining. The probably just look at the thing and see that there's bad information and/or risk of liability (of one type or another).
What I see a lot of on here (and I have no idea about the Hub you wrote and had taken down, and haven't even (sorry) ever seen any or your Hubs, so my remark here is only in general terms) is that a writer, who isn't adequately familiar with "the big picture" or else "the microscopic picture" or else with generally good practices when it comes to presenting material/information, will do a little research (or even not do any), and ends up with something that looks good to him but not to the number of people who are more familiar with that larger picture, more microscopic picture and/or generally good practices that (even if the writer isn't as familiar with that stuff) "everyone" else often knows. (Obviously "everyone" is an exaggeration, because if the writer doesn't know it that means a lot of other people don't either. Still, it's stuff that a very large percentage of the general population generally knows.)
So, in an example like the marble-comment Hub above, if a sixteen-year-old, part-time, retail clerk flagged it and told HP, "I think you could be sued because someone on your site implies that marbles are OK for two-year-olds, or else says, "ABC Toy Company recommends marbles..." there'd be no particular need for staff to look much beyond the complaint because "everyone knows" that marbles are not recommended by "anyone who knows" for two-year-olds; and whether or not the writer and/or the site could be sued for by ABC Toy Company a) is a separate issue that doesn't even matter because the Hub's already coming down based on other grounds, or b) staff could recognize could possibly sue on its own grounds (of one sort or another) and not want to even have to worry about it (especially if the points-of-contention weren't as obvious and clear as in something like the "marble-point" Hub).
In other words, people (staff or "complainers" or anyone else) don't always need to be qualified experts to recognize something "iffy". It's up to a writer to know that he can present (if necessary, if required, or if he doesn't want the risk of having something deemed "iffy") plenty of back-up facts in plenty of reliable sources; and leave no question about whether or not what he's presented might be "iffy" in one way or another. Even something as simple as a more careful choice of words can make the difference between a piece of writing that looks out-and-out questionable/potentially questionable to anyone reading/judging it.
If a nut-job e.mails HP and says he's the president of ABC Toy Company and that the company didn't recommend marbles for two-year-olds (or else didn't recommend them without supervision), right off the bat it's obvious to HP staff that could potentially be an issue. It doesn't always necessarily even matter if the person is a nut-job or actually who he says he is.
TOS pretty much makes it clear that when we sign on we agree with the thing that if HP (or whatever other site) doesn't like/isn't comfortable with something we write they don't allow it. The writer who is comfortable in his own ability to recognize that he's covered all the bases, and who knows that he has done that with a particular piece of writing, can always publish the thing somewhere else. On the other hand, sometimes if a site won't allow some questionable things that site is also (whether they really care about this or not) actually protecting the writer from the same kind of potential legal (or other) problems. One problem on a site like this is that writers don't always know when they've "covered all the bases" because they're new to the game of baseball and don't know what, exactly, "covering" and/or "all the bases" actually involves. Even with that, though, it doesn't always really matter much who complained/flagged. I just matters that the HP person/people who reviewed it didn't like it/weren't comfortable with it.
The question Hubbers should be asking isn't, I don't think, what the credentials/credibility of the "complainer" are, but whether whatever it is that HP didn't like about the Hub is related to the fact that it's their site and they don't "x" on it, or to something that could cause the writer problems regardless of whether he posted it on his own, private, site.
(I don't really think the permission example is necessarily the best one, because using a picture of someone else with permission/license has its own process; and a person can either prove permission or license or not. The person who can't does run the risk that comes with not being able to prove permission and having to take something down; but again, the person who knows to be good and sure he has "provable permission" isn't going to run into the same problem.)
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