In Geiser v. Kuhns, the Supreme Court today holds that the anti-SLAPP statute (Code Civ. Proc., section 425.16), which allows for expedited screening of actions that could impede rights of free speech about public issues, applies when a real estate CEO seeks civil harassment restraining orders against picketers outside his house who were protesting his company’s business practices. Because the CEO dismissed his petitions for restraining orders, the case involves whether the picketers can recover attorney fees under the statute.
Three years ago, in FilmOn.com Inc v. DoubleVerify Inc. (2019) 7 Cal.5th 133 (see here), the court found activity that prompted a lawsuit was “too tenuously tethered to the issues of public interest they implicate, and too remotely connected to the public conversation about those issues, to merit protection under the [statute].” In today’s case, by contrast, the court’s unanimous opinion by Justice Goodwin Liu states that, although the catalyst for the protest was the eviction of just one couple from their home, “the demonstration was not only about the dispute over the [couple’s] long-term residence, but also about broader issues concerning unfair foreclosures and evictions” and that “[t]he context makes clear that this sidewalk protest furthered public discussion of the public issues it implicated.”
The court also retreats from language in its FilmOn decision, saying the decision’s “focus[ ] on ‘the content of the speech’ without consideration of its ‘context,’ . . . is not controlling because that issue was not presented in FilmOn.” (Citations omitted.)
The court reverses a divided unpublished opinion, the second one in the case (see here), by the Second District, Division Five, Court of Appeal.