Lafayette Morehouse, Inc. v. Chronicle Publishing Co.

In 1992, California enacted an anti-SLAPP statute. (Stats. 1992, ch. 726, § 2; Code Civ. Proc., § 425.16.) SLAPP is an acronym for Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation. SLAPP litigation, generally, is litigation without merit filed to dissuade or punish the exercise of First Amendment rights of defendants. (Hull v. Rossi (1993) 13 Cal.App.4th 1763, 1769 [ 17 Cal.Rptr.2d 457 ]; cf. Wilcox v. Superior Court (1994) 27 Cal.App.4th 809, 815-816 [ 33 Cal.Rptr.2d 446 ] (Wilcox).)

Anti-SLAPP statutes such as section 425.16 provide a procedural remedy to expose and dismiss at an early stage such nonmeritorious actions which chill, inter alia, “the valid exercise of the constitutional rights of freedom of speech . . . .” (Subd. (a).) Section 425.16, subdivision (b) does so by making “[a] cause of action against a person arising from any act of that person in furtherance of the person’s [constitutional] right of . . . free speech ... in connection with a public issue . . . subject to a special motion to strike,” unless the person asserting that cause of action establishes by pleading and affidavit a “probability” of prevailing thereon.

In this appeal, we hold: (1) the…