Plaintiffs Appealed, To No Avail, Even Though The Lower Court Reduced A Larger Request Of $221,510.50 And A Smaller Alternative Request Of $127,498.69.
This next case, Elliott v. Tyerman, Case No. B316104 (2d Dist., Div. 5 Dec. 22, 2022) (unpublished), illustrates that a litigant who has been hit with a substantially reduced SLAPP fee award than requested needs to carefully assess whether an appeal is prudent.
What happened here is that defendants won a SLAPP motion on four causes of action, but had the motion denied on the first three causes of action. Defendants moved for mandatory fees—in a reasonable amount—under CCP § 425.16(c)(1), making a request for $221,510.50 in fees based on hourly rates from $595-$1,600) or, alternatively, for four-sevenths of that amount ($127,498.69) for only prevailing on four of plaintiffs’ claims. The lower court found that $500 was the reasonable hourly rate for all work and found the number of hours billed were excessive, the success on the SLAPP motion was limited, and other services rendered on the motions were duplicative/redundant. The lower court awarded $49,000 to the defense, prompting an appeal by plaintiffs.
The 2/5 DCA affirmed the SLAPP fee award. Defendants’ victory on the four claims was far from trivial, given that the dismissed claims carried more liability exposure than the three claims remaining for adjudication. As far as the amount of the fee award, the lower court did substantially reduce the requests, with no abuse of discretion being shown by awarding a lower hourly rate and discounting the request for the factors it did (especially limited success). After all, plaintiff was the beneficiary of these reductions, such that an appeal seemed to be (and was) a longshot.
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