SLAPP: $3,000 SLAPP Fee Award Reversed Because Corporate Defendants’ Attorney Was Also Protecting His Personal Interests, So No Fees Were Warranted

Court Of Appeal Stirred Between Trope And PLCM Reasoning On Fee Recovery.

            Olin v. Grace, Case No. F083969 (5^th Dist. Mar. 30, 2023) (unpublished) was a situation where corporate defendants, represented by an individual defendant who was a wholly owned principal, won a SLAPP motion and subsequent fee award of $3,000.  The fee award was reversed as a matter of law on appeal.  The appellate panel had to steer between Trope (our Leading Case No. 12) and PLCM (our Leading Case No. 1) with respect to whether the fee recovery was for an in pro per attorney (precluded) or an in-house attorney (not precluded).  In the end, because the attorney representing the corporate attorneys did no work more than protecting his individual defendants for the corporate defendants, the Court of Appeal determined that the SLAPP motion was properly granted, but that the fee motion went POOF! legally, substantially relying on Carpenter v. Zuckerman v. Cohen, 195 Cal.App.4^th 373, 376 (2011) because the attorney defendant representing his own interests did not do anything more for the corporate defendants.