{"id":2114706,"date":"2026-08-27T14:18:31","date_gmt":"2026-08-27T11:18:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2114706"},"modified":"2026-08-27T14:18:31","modified_gmt":"2026-08-27T11:18:31","slug":"blake-lively-awarded-400000-of-8m-she-claimed-for-legal-fees-in-justin-baldoni-battle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2114706","title":{"rendered":"Blake Lively awarded $400,000 of $8m she claimed for legal fees in Justin Baldoni battle"},"content":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/1024\/branded_news\/442a\/live\/05023130-c21b-11ef-a2ca-e99d0c9a24e3.jpg”]<\/p>\n

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\"GettyGetty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Blake Lively’s lawyers say the “case was never about money \u2013 it was about accountability”<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Actress Blake Lively has been awarded $400,000 (\u00a3340,000) of the $8m (\u00a36.9m) she tried to claim from her former co-star Justin Baldoni to cover her legal fees and costs to fight a defamation case he brought.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Lively initially sued Baldoni, her co-star and director of the 2024 film It Ends With Us for sexual harassment and retaliation, before he countersued for defamation.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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A judge dismissed his defamation complaint in 2025, and she argued she was entitled to $7.5m (\u00a36.4m) to cover her lawyers’ fees and $540,000 (\u00a3460,000) for other costs.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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But the judge said she should receive considerably less – a total of $407,451 – because she requested money for more people and time than were necessary to defend the defamation claim.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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She should not have claimed money for other “intertwined” costs to do with the wider legal battle, and took a “blunderbuss approach” to calculating how many hours of lawyers’ time she could claim for, the judge said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\"ReutersReuters<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Justin Baldoni’s lawyer claimed the ruling as “a significant victory”<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Baldoni denied harassing Lively or orchestrating a smear campaign against her.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Earlier this year, the judge dismissed parts of Lively’s lawsuit against him including the sexual harassment element. The following month, the pair agreed a settlement to end the case.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The judge allowed Lively to recover some expenses under a 2023 California law designed to protect sexual harassment accusers from retaliatory defamation lawsuits brought by the men they accused.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Both sides painted US District Judge Lewis Liman’s latest decision as a victory.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Lively’s lawyers said: “This first-ever award of fees and costs under this California law is historic, and demonstrates that there are real consequences of bringing retaliatory lawsuits.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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“As we have said from day one, Blake Lively’s case was never about money \u2013 it was about accountability.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Baldoni’s lawyer Bryan Freedman said: “The ruling is a significant victory for my clients and sends a clear message that, no matter how powerful you may be, the courtroom is not a place to take advantage of the law for your own personal gain.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

[analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/news\/articles\/c0lrwlzrk86o”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/1024\/branded_news\/442a\/live\/05023130-c21b-11ef-a2ca-e99d0c9a24e3.jpg”] Getty Images Blake Lively’s lawyers say the “case was never about money \u2013 it was about accountability” Actress Blake Lively has been awarded $400,000 (\u00a3340,000) of the $8m (\u00a36.9m) she tried to claim from her former co-star Justin Baldoni to cover her legal fees and costs to fight a defamation case he […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[35,226],"class_list":["post-2114706","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-bbc-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2114706","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2114706"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2114706\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2114706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2114706"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2114706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}