Sonoma Media Invs., LLC v. Superior Court of Sonoma Cnty.

Plaintiff William Gallaher is a real estate developer in Santa Rosa. During the 2016 Santa Rosa City Council (sometimes City Council) election, defendant The Press Democrat published a series of five articles about substantial independent election expenditures made by Gallaher's son-in-law, plaintiff Scott Flater, on behalf of three City Council candidates. Plaintiffs allege the articles falsely implied that Gallaher was the source of the funds spent by Flater during the 2016 election. Plaintiffs brought suit against The Press Democrat, Sonoma Media Investments, LLC (the owner of the newspaper), Kevin McCallum (the author of the articles), 1 and David McCuan (a professor quoted in one of the articles), asserting causes of action *28 for defamation, libel per se, and false light invasion of privacy. Defendants moved to strike the complaint pursuant to the anti-SLAPP statute, 2 section 425.16 of the Code of Civil Procedure (Section 425.16).

The trial court granted the motion in part, denied the motion in part, and continued the motion in part to permit plaintiffs to conduct discovery on the issue of whether defendants acted with malice as to their statements regarding Flater.…