Shahid Buttar for Congress Committee v. Hearst Communications, Inc.
- Edward Chen
- 3:21-cv-05566
- U.S. District Court · Northern District of California
- 10
In Shahid Buttar for Congress Committee v. Hearst Communications, Judge Chen awarded Hearst $87,259.55 in fees and $634 in costs after dismissing plaintiffs’ claims.
Hearst Communications, Inc. receives the fee and cost award. Shahid Buttar and Shahid Buttar for Congress Committee share responsibility for the fee obligation, subject to the court’s further consideration of the financial information it ordered them to submit.
What happened
Shahid Buttar and Shahid Buttar for Congress Committee sued Hearst Communications, Inc. over San Francisco Chronicle stories reporting allegations that Buttar sexually harassed an acquaintance. The court previously dismissed their defamation and unfair-competition claims under California’s anti-SLAPP law, with prejudice after an amended complaint.
Hearst asked for attorneys’ fees and costs under the anti-SLAPP statute. The plaintiffs argued that Hearst should not recover fees for work on the original complaint and questioned the requested hourly rates. The court rejected those arguments, finding that Hearst achieved a meaningful victory when claims about the first article were dismissed with prejudice and that its later motion eliminated the remaining claims.
Judge Edward M. Chen granted Hearst’s motion for attorneys’ fees and costs. He awarded $87,259.55 in fees and $634 in costs, and gave Buttar and the campaign committee an opportunity to submit sealed financial information before the fee obligation was finalized.
The detailed version
- Shahid Buttar for Congress Committee v. Hearst Communications, Inc. · No. 3:21-cv-05566
- Edward Chen
- Apr. 18, 2023
Background
Shahid Buttar and Shahid Buttar for Congress Committee (collectively, “SBCC”) sued Hearst Communications, Inc. for defamation and violation of California’s unfair-competition law. The claims arose from two San Francisco Chronicle stories published in July 2020 about allegations that Buttar sexually harassed an acquaintance several years earlier.
The court first dismissed the claims related to the first article with prejudice, meaning those claims could not be refiled, while allowing SBCC to amend its claims related to the follow-up article. After SBCC filed an amended complaint, the court dismissed the remaining claims related to the follow-up article with prejudice. SBCC appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on March 18, 2023.
Fee entitlement
Hearst moved for attorneys’ fees and costs under California’s anti-SLAPP statute. Anti-SLAPP laws provide a procedure for challenging lawsuits arising from protected speech or petitioning activity; California’s statute generally requires a prevailing defendant to receive reasonable attorneys’ fees and costs.
The court found that Hearst was the prevailing party because its anti-SLAPP motions ultimately disposed of all SBCC’s claims. The court rejected SBCC’s argument that Hearst should receive fees only for work on the amended complaint. It distinguished a decision in which the first dismissal was merely procedural and the plaintiff was allowed to re-allege the same claims. Here, the court had dismissed the claims related to the first article on the merits and with prejudice, producing a meaningful change in the case’s posture. Hearst therefore could seek fees incurred throughout the litigation.
Amount of the award
The court used the lodestar method, which calculates a fee by multiplying the reasonable hours worked by a reasonable hourly rate. It found Hearst’s requested $87,259.55 in attorneys’ fees and $634 in costs reasonable.
The award included $66,780 in fees for Hearst’s in-house counsel and $20,479.55 for outside counsel. The court found the work sufficiently specific, relevant, and non-redundant. It also found the hourly rates reasonable based on comparable rates in other cases and included time spent preparing the fee motion itself.
The court rejected SBCC’s late argument that Buttar’s financial resources should prevent or reduce the award. It stated that limited financial resources do not automatically prevent a prevailing defendant from recovering fees when the law requires an award. Because the record did not include documentation supporting the claimed financial limitations, the court gave Buttar and the campaign committee one opportunity to submit, under penalty of perjury, information about their income, assets, and financial status. The information could be filed under seal and used only for the litigation. Hearst could file a short sealed response.
Disposition
The court GRANTED Hearst’s Motion for Attorneys’ Fees and Costs. It awarded $87,259.55 in attorneys’ fees—$66,780 in in-house fees and $20,479.55 in outside counsel fees—and $634 in costs. The order disposed of Docket No. 69.
Read the full 10-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.