Thursday, May 28, 2026
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Ninth Circuit Affirms Attorney-Fee Award in Case Where Malpractice Suit Was Found to Be SLAPP
District Court Found $450 an Hour Is Reasonable Rate in San Diego
By a MetNews Staff Writer
The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals yesterday affirmed a supplemental attorney fee award that was based on a finding that $450 an hour is a reasonable amount charged by a seasoned lawyer practicing in San Diego when defending a client against an anti-SLAPP motion.
District Court Judge Linda Lopez on May 9, 2024, awarded $42,435 to attorneys Ellis Roy Stern and Alan N. Goldberg and their Encino law firm client, Stern & Goldberg. The award related to defending against an interim appeal by plaintiff Laura Lynn Hammett from an earlier award and other efforts to defeat that award.
Hammett sued Chatsworth attorney Patrick Christopher McGarrigle, the firm of McGarrigle Kenney & Zampiello, APC, as well as Stern, Goldberg, and their firm for conversion and malpractice.
Lopez found that “$450 per hour is a reasonable rate informed by the prevailing rate for similar work in San Diego.”
Hammett asserted that the award weas unconstitutionally oppressive under the Ninth Circuit’s 2022 decision in Wakefield v. ViSalus. Yesterday’s memorandum opinion by a three-judge panel says:
“Wakefield held that an award of nearly one billion dollars in aggregate statutory damages for sending robocalls was possibly ‘wholly disproportioned’ and ‘obviously unreasonable’ in relation to the statute’s ‘compensatory or deterrence goals.’…Unlike in Wakefield, here the district court ensured through its lodestar analysis that the fee award was reasonable. Accordingly, the district court did not abuse its discretion.”
The opinion—signed by Circuit Judges Salvador Mendoza Jr., Johnnie B. Rawlinson. and Holly A. Thomas—says in a footnote:
“Hammett raised her Wakefield argument before the district court in her opposition to the renewed motion for attorneys’ fees. The district court rejected this argument in its fee order, finding Wakefield inapposite because it did not involve attorneys’ fees or anti-SL APP assertions.”
The case is Hammett v. Stern, 24-3621.
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