Kelli L. Sager

In addition to her work defending studios, producers and writers against ideas submission claims, Sager spends her time representing newspapers and media outlets, including the Los Angeles Times, BBC, UK publisher DMG Media and the Daily Journal.

In mid-April, three years of litigation concluded on a defamation and wrongful termination case brought against the Los Angeles Times. The Times had dropped Frederick Theodore Rall, a freelance cartoonist, in 2015 after he wrote a blog post for the paper claiming he had been arrested for jaywalking in a contentious altercation. After reviewing audio and records from the arrest, the Times had serious questions about the blog post’s accuracy, issued an editor’s note to readers to that effect and dropped Rall, according to the complaint.

Rall sued the newspaper, claiming falsities in the editor’s note and wrongful termination, but the trial court granted three anti-SLAPP motions brought by the Times and dismissed all of Rall’s claims. The Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal, as well as a $350,000 award of attorney fees. Rall v. Tribune 365 LLC, 2019 DJDAR 549 (Cal. App. 2nd Dist., Jan. 22, 2019).

“With any journalist of any kind, whether it’s a cartoonist or a reporter or an editorial writer, if a publication has a question about whether something the person has done is not accurate, then I think they’re obligated to look at whether there’s a problem with the reporting,” Sager said. “No one has the right to insist that the Times publish their work.”

The state Supreme Court has held the case until a similar case, Wilson v. CNN, is decided.

In another recent decision, Sager defended BBC entities sued by Kieu Hoang, a Vietnamese-American business executive who claimed a third-party post on a BBC Facebook page was defamatory. Sager argued the Communications Decency Act doesn’t allow web hosts to be held liable for third-party posts.

“BBC didn’t write the article,” she said. “Under the law, they’re not legally responsible for it.”

The trial court agreed, dismissing the case in December. In February, the court awarded BBC $100,000 in attorney fees. Hoang v. BBC Global News Ltd.. 56-2018-00507910 (Ventura Sup. Ct., filed Feb. 8, 2018).

Sager said she’s seen a recent uptick in defamation suits, though none have been successful so far.

“Maybe that’s because we have someone in the White House who claims he’s going to change libel law and has a lot of people around him who’ve been fairly aggressive about challenging the press,” she said. “Or maybe it’s just a coincidence.”

— Erin Lee