As Snoop Dogg awaits the outcome of his appeal of a judge’s mixed ruling on his motion to dismiss most claims in a woman’s revived lawsuit accusing him of sexual assault in 2013 and defaming her on social media in 2022, a judge has denied the rapper’s request for nearly $110,000 in attorneys’ fees for winning his part of the decision.
In her Los Angeles Superior Court suit, the woman identified only as Jane Doe alleges the 53-year-old, Long Beach-born performer, whose real name is Calvin Broadus, forced her into a sex act in a recording studio bathroom in 2013.
On Thursday, Judge Thomas D. Long denied Broadus’ motion for attorneys’ fees, saying that it was not possible to distinguish between what legal work was done on the part of the case where fees are recoverable and the part where they are not.
“Accordingly, the motion for attorneys’ sees is hereby denied,” Long wrote.
In August 2023, attorneys for the record producer filed an anti-SLAPP motion seeking dismissal of several of Doe’s causes of action, including defamation. The motion did not target her sexual assault and sexual battery claims.
The state’s anti-SLAPP — Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation — law is intended to prevent people from using courts, and potential threats of a lawsuit, to intimidate those who are exercising their First Amendment rights
According to the rapper’s attorneys’ court papers, the plaintiff “seeks to put Mr. Broadus on trial in violation of his free speech and petition rights, (for) an Instagram post hallmarked by loose interpretations of a judge and police emoji, an unnamed spokesperson’s verbal statement to media denying the allegations of a now-dismissed federal action and an attorney correspondence … occurring in the adversarial grounds of litigation.”
In February 2024, the judge found that only the attorney correspondence was protected speech. For that partial win, the rapper, in court papers filed previously, sought $109,360 in attorneys’ fees. Broadus also is appealing the part of the anti-SLAPP ruling that was to Doe’s advantage.
In their pleadings, Doe’s attorneys stated that the money sought by the singer’s attorneys involves “deceptive” double-filling and that if the amount sounds “exorbitant, inflated and unreasonable, that’s because it is.”
Broadus’ fee claim, if granted, would “discourage any litigant from ever bringing well-founded sexual harassment or defamation claims,” the suit stated.
In her lawsuit, Doe maintained she was “subjected to the most appalling sexual harassment and assault and that this was part of a common plan and practice to prey on and then intimidate and silence” women like herself who want a career in show business.
“True to form, Snoop Dogg and his minions then named and shamed plaintiff on social media and the press in a transparent attempt to intimidate her into submission with veiled threats of violence,” Doe’s court papers further stated.
The performer’s attorneys acknowledge in their court papers that in February 2022 their client posted on Instagram, “Gold digger season is here be careful Nefews.” They say the two communications found actionable by the judge “were made in a public forum and directly relate to the public interest and are unquestionably protected speech.”
The rapper’s attorneys stated that Doe’s current case, filed in June 2022, is the fifth version of her litigation after the most recent prior version brought in federal court was dismissed.