Watkins

BACKGROUND

The parties Watkins is the owner of a single-family residence located at 3760 California Avenue in Long Beach, California. She has owned that property since February 2000.

All further statutory references are to the Code of Civil Procedure, unless stated otherwise. Section 425.16 is sometimes referred to as the anti-SLAPP statute. SLAPP is an acronym for strategic lawsuit against public participation.

2 D’Orio owns a single family residence located at 3758 California Avenue (the D’Orio property), next door to Watkins’s property. D’Orio’s predecessors in interest, Michael and Heather Kimel, owned the D’Orio property from September 2016 to June 3, 2020, when they sold it to D’Orio. Watkins’s action against the Kimels On August 6, 2018, the Kimels filed an action against Watkins asserting causes of action for willful trespass, negligent trespass, quiet title, intentional misrepresentation, and declaratory relief, alleging that Watkins’s garage, a block wall, a fence, and an archway between the two properties unlawfully encroached on the Kimel property (which would become the D’Orio property). The Kimels dismissed without prejudice their complaint against Watkins…