Facts

Around January 2010, Los Angeles County began merging the Office of Public Safety (OPS) and the Sheriff's Dept. As part of that merger, 500 officers of the OPS were offered positions at the Sheriff's Dept. They also had to undergo an application process, complete with a background check. The information included in the application and background checks was confidential and privileged.

At some point, Robert Faturechi obtained background information from the applications of those officers. Faturechi then claimed that he would publish an article making certain confidential information public.

The Association for Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs (ALADS) filed suit against Faturechi and Los Angeles Times Communications LLC to prevent that information from being published.

PLAINTIFFS' CONTENTIONS:
Plaintiffs sought a temporary restraining order or an injunction preventing the release of the officers' confidential information. Plaintiffs argued that that Robert Faturechi has been unlawfully in possession of the 500 personnel files at issue and either stole, or received from someone who stole, the confidential personnel files. Plaintiffs also contended that the requested injunction didn't constitute an unlawful prior restrain on speech in that the requested order was content neutral, as it does not preclude the times from taking any particular position on an issue.

Plaintiffs argued that the information which Faturechi seeks to publish is not related to a matter of public interest as the information is all statutorily or constitutionally confidential such as financial information, medical records, discipline records, addresses, dates of birth, and social security numbers for the Deputy as well as for all his family members, extended family members, including in-laws and ex-in-laws, and every other person the Deputy lived with for a 5 year period. Further, the information could remotely relate only to an issue which the Times itself has created, with no evidence of any actual public interest in the topic (i.e., the Sheriff's Department's background investigation process, which plaintiff claimed the Times believes is in some manner faulty).

Plaintiffs argued that defendants unlawfully obtained, possessed and intend to publish confidential information concerning plaintiffs, and that the injunction was necessary to prevent the unlawful publication of the information. Also, in addition to causing irreparable harm to the affected officers, the publication of the unlawfully possessed information would likewise cause irreparable harm to the officers' uninvolved family members and friends.

DEFENDANT'S CONTENTIONS:
The defendants filed a special motion to strike, arguing that the plaintiffs' claim arose over an expression of free speech, and that the plaintiffs had not demonstrated a probability of prevailing on its claim. They argued that ALADS was unconstitutionally trying to obtain a prior restraint on speech.

Result

The court granted the defendants' special motion to strike.