On Thursday, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Mitchell L. Beckloff held a hearing on the defendants’ special motion to strike Goossen’s complaint under California’s law against suits used to curtail First Amendment rights, known as the anti-SLAPP statute. Judge Beckloff issued an oral tentative ruling saying he was likely to grant the motion, as the law protects “fair and true” reports of legal proceedings, and Goossen hadn’t yet shown that McCarroll had made false statements willfully or maliciously.

At the hearing, James R. Molen of Greenberg Glusker Fields Claman & Machtinger LLP, representing Goossen, urged Judge Beckloff to reverse his tentative, arguing that when McCarroll said Goossen had failed “in every instance” to provide Ward with financial disclosures required by federal law, he actually knew Ward had signed his approval on disclosures issued by Goossen after multiple fights. Molen said McCarroll knew he was lying with the intention of gaining an upper hand in Ward’s litigation.

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