Nashville, Tenn. - The Tennessee Supreme Court has held that the defendants in a legal malpractice and fraud action were not entitled to dismissal of the lawsuits under the Tennessee Public Participation Act (“TPPA”) because the lawsuits were not filed in response to the defendants’ exercise of the right to petition.
Jerry and Justin Mitchell represented Alan Cartwright in a series of lawsuits against Alice and Alan Garner, Cartwright’s sister and brother-in-law, related to the Garners’ administration of a family trust. The lawsuits were eventually resolved in favor of the Garners.
Cartwright later sued the Mitchells for legal malpractice and fraudulent concealment, alleging that the Mitchells knew the claims against the Garners were non-meritorious and had wrongfully proceeded with the claims anyway. The Garners separately sued the Mitchells under the tort-of-another doctrine. Both lawsuits also named the Mitchells’ law firms as defendants under a theory of vicarious liability.
The defendants sought to dismiss the lawsuits under the TPPA, Tennessee’s version of an anti-SLAPP statute. The TPPA allows a party to seek dismissal of a lawsuit filed “in response to that party’s exercise of the right to free speech, right to petition, or right of association.” Tenn. Code Ann. § 20-17-105(a). The defendants argued that both lawsuits were filed in response to Mitchells’ exercise of the right to petition. The trial court declined to dismiss the lawsuits, but the Court of Appeals reversed. The Tennessee Supreme Court granted Cartwright and the Garners permission to appeal.
In Cartwright’s appeal, the Tennessee Supreme Court held that the defendants were not entitled to dismissal under the TPPA. The Court held that a lawyer who files a lawsuit on behalf of a client is not personally exercising the right to petition, but at most, only facilitating his client’s exercise of that right. The defendants therefore could not show that Cartwright’s claims were filed in response to the Mitchells’ exercise of the right to petition. The Court issued a separate opinion in the Garners’ appeal reaching the same conclusion. The Court reversed the judgments of the Court of Appeals and remanded for further proceedings.
To read the Supreme Court’s unanimous opinions in Cartwright v. Thomason Hendrix, P.C. and Garner v. Thomason, Hendrix, Harvey, Johnson & Mitchell, PLLC, authored by Justice Sarah K. Campbell, please visit the opinions section of TNCourts.gov. Justices Dwight Tarwater and Mary Wagner did not participate. J. Ross Dyer and Jeffrey Usman participated as Special Justices.