Sellars v. Rose CA4/3

Filed 11/10/26 Sellars v. Rose CA4/3 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115. IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT DIVISION THREE JOHN SELLARS et al., Plaintiffs and Appellants, G066255 v. (Super. Ct. No. 30-2024- 01442186) KAREN ROSE, OPINION Defendant and Respondent. Appeal from an order of the Superior Court of Orange County, Bradley Erdosi, Judge. Affirmed and remanded with instructions. Rod Pacheco and Irasema Rocha for Plaintiffs and Appellants. Ryan E. Carreon for Defendant and Respondent.  Plaintiffs John Sellars, Terri Sellars, and Christopher Sellars appeal from an award of attorney fees to defendant Karen Rose after she filed a successful anti-SLAPP motion to strike their complaint. Finding no abuse of discretion, we affirm. FACTS1 This is a case for slander per se arising from statements that Rose made about plaintiffs on a 2024 podcast. Rose successfully moved to strike the complaint under the anti-SLAPP statute and then filed a motion for $342,523 in attorney fees ($171,261.50 in claimed fees, doubled pursuant to Civil Code2 section 47.1). Plaintiffs opposed the fee motion and submitted a spreadsheet identifying their various objections to counsel’s specific billing entries. The trial court granted the fee motion in part and denied it in part, awarding Rose $161,886 in fees. It found the claimed hourly rates of $895 and $595 for Rose’s counsel were reasonable given “counsels’ experience, the contingent nature of the case, the legal market, and the nature of the action.” It also found “the majority of the line items being attacked withstand scrutiny and the tasks described are related to the motion.” However, acknowledging that some billed tasks were “not properly related to the motion” or “too vaguely described to be attributed with any certainty to the anti-SLAPP motion,” the court reduced the claimed amount of $171,261.50 by 1 A more thorough recitation of the facts can be found in our published opinion Sellars v. Rose (Nov. ___, 2026, No. G066234) __ Cal.App.5th __, in which we affirm the trial court’s order granting Rose’s anti-SLAPP motion. 2 All further undesignated statutory references are to this code. 2 $9,375.50 to a “lodestar of $161,886.00.” The court also declined Rose’s request for a multiplier under section 47.1. DISCUSSION The anti-SLAPP statute provides that “a prevailing defendant on a special motion to strike shall be entitled to recover that defendant’s attorney’s fees and costs.” (Code Civ. Proc., § 425.16, subd. (c)(1).) Such an award is “mandatory.” (Marshall v. Webster (2020) 54 Cal.App.5th 275, 285 (Marshall).) The fee award “properly includes attorney fees incurred to litigate the special motion to strike (the merits fees) plus the fees incurred in connection with litigating the fee award itself (the fees on fees). [Citation.] However, [it] may not include matters unrelated to the anti-SLAPP motion, such as ‘attacking service of process [or] preparing and revising an answer to the complaint . . . .’” (569 East County Boulevard LLC v. Backcountry Against the Dump, Inc. (2016) 6 Cal.App.5th 426, 433.) “In short, the award of fees is designed to ‘“reimburs[e] the prevailing defendant for expenses incurred in extracting herself from a baseless lawsuit”’ [citation] rather than to reimburse the defendant for all expenses incurred in the baseless lawsuit.” (Ibid.) A trial court computes the amount of a fee award using “the familiar ‘lodestar’ method. [Citation.] Under that method, the court ‘tabulates the attorney fee touchstone, or lodestar, by multiplying the number of hours reasonably expended by the reasonable hourly rate prevailing in the community for similar work.’” (Cabral v. Martins (2009) 177 Cal.App.4th 471, 491.) “The relevant ‘community’ is generally based on where the services are rendered, i.e., where the court is located”—in this case, Orange County. (Tidrick v. FCA US LLC (2025) 112 Cal.App.5th 1147, 1157 (Tidrick).) 3  “We review the trial court’s determination of the amount of the award for abuse of discretion and will not set aside the award ‘“absent a showing that it is manifestly excessive in the circumstances.”’” (Marshall, supra, 54 Cal.App.5th at p. 285.) In conducting our review, we are mindful that the “‘“experienced trial judge is the best judge of the value of professional services rendered in his court, and while his judgment is of course subject to review, it will not be disturbed unless the appellate court is convinced that it is clearly wrong.”’” (Ketchum v. Moses (2001) 24 Cal.4th 1122, 1132.) Applying that deferential standard here, we have no basis to overturn the fee award. To begin with, the hourly rates claimed by Rose’s attorneys ($595 and $895) were supported by their declarations, and we “may not reweigh on appeal a trial court’s assessment of [those] declarations.” (Christian Research Institute v. Alnor (2008) 165 Cal.App.4th 1315, 1323 (Christian Research).) Further, although the claimed rates are certainly on the higher end, they do not shock the conscience; indeed, this court recently affirmed an attorney fee award in an Orange County malicious prosecution case where the attorneys’ hourly rates ranged from $550 to $975. (Baer v. Tedder (2025) 115 Cal.App.5th 1139, 1158−1161; cf. Christian Research, at p. 1324 [Orange County trial court awarded $300 per hour in defamation case almost 20 years ago].) Given counsel’s claimed experience, their rates are not manifestly outside the realm of what an experienced civil litigator would charge to defend a slander case in Orange County.3 3 Plaintiffs cite our recent decision in Tidrick, supra, 112 Cal.App.5th 1147, for the proposition that “$415–$500 per hour [is] the prevailing hourly rate in Orange County.” (Id. at p. 1152.) That is not what Tidrick held. Those amounts were the rates claimed by counsel, not what was awarded by the court. (Id. at pp. 1158, 1160 [reversing fee award and noting 4  Plaintiffs further assert the amount of time claimed is excessive. This argument has some initial appeal: despite defense counsel’s claimed expertise, it evidently took two partners and one associate over 220 hours to litigate the merits of their 15-page anti-SLAPP motion and a subsequent fee motion. But the trial court already took into account the considerable time spent when it deducted $9,375.50 from the amount claimed. Although its minute order did not specify which time entries it considered problematic, the court was not required to issue a statement of decision in support of its fee award, and we presume it followed the law in conducting its lodestar analysis. (Christian Research, supra, 165 Cal.App.4th at p. 1323.) Further, having reviewed plaintiffs’ table of objectionable time entries, we cannot say the trial court abused its discretion in failing to reduce the time further. Many of the time entries that plaintiffs assert are unrelated to preparation of the anti-SLAPP motion were plainly necessary to preparing the motion (e.g., listening to the podcast episodes and conferring with the client about strategy). And despite plaintiffs’ objections to entries for communications among counsel, “some conferences between counsel might be expected, particularly in a case of some complexity.” (Building a Better Redondo, Inc. v. City of Redondo Beach (2012) 203 Cal.App.4th 852, 872, fn. 14.) trial court failed to specify what hourly rate it applied when calculating lodestar].) Plaintiffs also assert the court here improperly awarded “higher, out-of-town” rates. But the court acknowledged in its minute order that it took into account “the legal market” when approving counsel’s rates. We take that to mean the Orange County legal market, and plaintiffs have not shown otherwise. 5  Likewise, we cannot say, on this record, that the total amount of time claimed (223.7 hours) was unreasonable as a matter of law. (Premier Medical Management Systems, Inc. v. California Ins. Guarantee Assn. (2008) 163 Cal.App.4th 550, 560−561 [rejecting argument that spending 345 hours on joint anti-SLAPP was “unreasonably excessive,” and declining invitation to set 50-hour limit for anti-SLAPP motions].)4 The fact that the anti-SLAPP motion involved a matter of first impression not yet addressed by California courts (the applicability of section 47.1, which took effect in 2024), and resulted in a published appellate opinion, further weighs in favor of the significant amount of time spent by counsel in litigating the motion. Rose contends she is entitled to her attorney fees on appeal. She is correct. (Tuchscher Development Enterprises, Inc. v. San Diego Unified Port Dist. (2003) 106 Cal.App.4th 1219, 1248.) The amount shall be determined by the trial court on remand. 4 Of course, not every anti-SLAPP motion requires hundreds of hours. (See Weiser Law Firm, P.C. v. Hartleib (C.D. Cal., Aug. 8, 2023, No. SACV 23-00171-CJC (JDEX)) 2023 WL 5423028, at *3 [Hon. Cormac J. Carney found 306.5 hours spent on three anti-SLAPP motions and two motions to dismiss in federal court in Orange County was “simply excessive”]; Christian Research, supra, 165 Cal.App.4th at pp. 1318–1319 [affirming trial court’s award of 71 hours, rather than claimed 638.6 hours, for prevailing party on anti-SLAPP motion in defamation case]; Maughan v. Google Tech., Inc. (2006) 143 Cal. App. 4th 1242, 1249, 1251 [affirming trial court’s finding that 50 hours, rather than the claimed 200 hours, was reasonable for prevailing party’s anti-SLAPP and fee motions].) But the deferential standard of review matters, especially where the experienced and capable trial judge who awarded the fees also carefully worked through the underlying motion and was thoroughly familiar with it. (Christian Research, at p. 1323.) 6  DISPOSITION The order awarding Rose $161,886 in attorney fees is affirmed. Rose shall recover her costs and attorney fees on appeal. The matter is remanded to the trial court to determine the amount of attorney fees. SCOTT, J. WE CONCUR: MOORE, ACTING P. J. SERVINO, J. 7