Jacob v. Bezzant [1]

In 1999, Brett Bezzant, then-owner of the American Fork Citizen New Utah!, a local newspaper, published a political advertisement prepared and paid for by Bill Jacob, which claimed that an American Fork City ordinance barred two men from running for City Council, despite a legal opinion from the city's attorneys that said otherwise. Jacob's name was not on the flier. After the two candidates complained to Bezzant, he paid for and published an "Urgent Election Notice" that apologized to the two men, named Jacob as the author of the political advertisement, and called it a "classic example of negative campaigning." Bezzant distributed the notice by mail to American Fork residents and posted it on the newspaper's website.

Jacob filed a lawsuit against Bezzant, claiming the notice contained defamatory language and portrayed him in a false light. Bezzant filed a counterclaim under Utah's Citizen Participation in Government Act, also known as the Anti-SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation) Act.  The trial court dismissed Jacob's defamation claims and granted Bezzant attorney's fees under the Anti-SLAPP Act and a federal civil rights statute (42 U.S.C. § 1988(b) [2]).

On appeal, the Utah Supreme Court held [3] in a June 2009 opinion that dismissal of Jacob's defamation suit and awarding of attorney's fees was inappropriate under the Anti-SLAPP Act because Bezzant's election notice was not "participati[on] in the process of government."  Utah Code Ann. § 78B-6-1403(1) (2008) [4].  However, the Utah Supreme Court upheld the trial court's dismissal of the defamation suit as lacking legal merit and the award of partial attorney's fees under the civil rights statute.  The court declined to address the issue, raised by Jacobs for the first time on appeal, of whether Utah's Anti-SLAPP Act is unconstitutional under the Utah Constitution.