Also, CCP § 177.5 $1,000 Sanctions Award Reviewable Only By Writ.
In Shalant v. Mackston, Case No. B250208 (2d Dist., Div. 8 Dec. 8, 2014) (unpublished), defendants won a SLAPP motion—the merits of which were never appealed—and plaintiff suffered a combined adverse fee award of $138,972 under the mandatory SLAPP fee-shifting statute. One of the pro per plaintiffs also suffered a $1,000 sanctions award under CCP § 177.5, payable to the court, for filing an oversized brief after denial of an ex parte application for such relief. The fee and sanctions awards were the subjects of an appeal by the losing side.
Nothing changed on appeal.
Because the SLAPP motions disposed of all or most of the claims for the two sets of defendants, the motions were causally related enough such that all the time was compensable. (Vargas v. City of Salinas, 200 Cal.App.4th 1331, 1351 (2011).) The hourly rates being sought, $150-450 per hour, were reasonable because the trial judge determined that $500 per hour was a good lodestar hourly rate for the Los Angeles-venued defense counsel in this particular case. Also, nothing in the law said that 100% of the defense requests could not be granted, the case here, especially given that plaintiff drove up the expenses through his litigation activities. Finally, time was compensable even though it did not have the magic language “SLAPP motion” in the time entries, with the defense attorneys needed to also analyze the underlying malicious prosecution complaint in order to prepare the SLAPP motions.
The problem with the $1,000 sanctions appeal was that it was an interlocutory order which had to be reviewed by writ, not appeal. So, no go on the challenge to this one.