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C.A. Orders Publication of Opinion Declaring Entreaty to Fire Lawyer to Be ‘Protected’
By a MetNews Staff Writer
Div. Six of the Court of Appeal for this district yesterday ordered publication of its June 6 decision in which it held that a man engaged in protected conduct, for the purpose of the anti-SLAPP statute, when he urged his parents to fire their lawyer, which they did.
Tarzana attorney Ray B. Bowen Jr. sued pediatrician Calvin Lin for intentionally interfering with prospective economic relations and intentionally and negligently interfered with contractual relations by causing his parents to give Bowen the boot. At Lin’s urging, the parents had their daughter, Westlake Village attorney Gail C. Lin, take over their action for property damage against a neighbor which Bowen had been handling.
Ventura Superior Court Judge Henry J. Walsh denied Calvin Lin’s anti-SLAPP motion.
In an opinion reversing Walsh’s order, Justice Martin J. Tangeman said that Calvin Lin’s entreaties to his parents are protected under subd. (e)(2) of the anti-SLAPP statute, Code of Civil Procedure §425.16: “any written or oral statement or writing made in connection with an issue under consideration or review by a…judicial body.”
The communications were not “tangential” to the parents’ lawsuit, as Walsh believed, “but directly pertained to its resolution,” Tangeman wrote.
Bowen also sued Gail Lin and the parents and. The opinion affirms the granting of Gail Lin’s special motion to strike and also reverses denials of anti-SLAPP motions filed by the parents, finding their conduct to be protected. The case remanded for a determination as to whether Calvin Lin and his parents can meet the second prong of §425.16 by showing a probability of prevailing on the merits.
A news report on the case appeared in the METNEWS’s June 7 issue.
The opinion in Bowen v. Lin appears in today’s Slip Opinion Supplement at Page 2652.
Nicholas T. Hua, Giacomo Gallai and Steven C. Gonzalez of the Glendale law firm of Hua Gallai & Gonzalez represented the Lins. Bowen was self-represented, and was joined by Tarzana attorney James Alfred Howard.
It was Hua who made a request for publication of the opinion. Bowen filed opposition.
The Commission on Judicial Appointments will meet in Ventura on Aug. 3 to consider the nomination by Gov. Gavin Newsom of San Luis Obispo Superior Court Judge Hernaldo J. Baltodano as a replacement for Tangeman, who will be retiring.
Copyright 2022, Metropolitan News Company