Judge orders Baldoni to pay Lively fees, denies damages

A federal judge ruled Friday that actor Justin Baldoni must pay the legal fees incurred by his former co-star Blake Lively in defending against his defamation lawsuit, while denying her request for additional financial damages. The decision by U.S. District Judge Lewis J. Liman marks a significant postscript to the nearly two-year legal battle between the two stars of the 2024 film "It Ends With Us."

Judge Liman ruled that Lively is entitled to recover her attorneys' fees and costs under California's Protecting Survivors from Weaponized Defamation Lawsuits Act, known as Civil Code Section 47.1. The law, enacted in 2023, is designed to protect individuals who make allegations of sexual misconduct from retaliatory defamation lawsuits. The judge found that Lively's statements fell under the law's purview, that she prevailed in having Baldoni's suit dismissed, and that there was no evidence she acted with malice.

However, the judge denied Lively's motion to seek treble and punitive damages under the same statute. Liman wrote that the California law establishes a narrow exception for fee recovery but does not create an end run around federal procedural rules for awarding such...