## Facts

- Balboa Island Village Inn, Inc. operated a restaurant and bar in Newport Beach; Aric Toll purchased it in 2000.
- Anne Lemen owned a nearby home across an alley and repeatedly complained to authorities about noise and customers’ behavior.
- Lemen extensively recorded the Inn, including repeated videotaping and photographing patrons, sometimes for hours and sometimes following customers to and from cars.
- Lemen confronted potential patrons numerous times, used derogatory epithets, and made disparaging remarks about the Inn’s food and clientele, allegedly deterring customers.
- The Inn alleged Lemen made false factual accusations to third parties that the Inn served alcohol to minors, permitted illegal drug use, allowed prostitution, and violated laws and regulations.
- The Inn sued for defamation and related claims and primarily sought injunctive relief barring repetition of statements found false and defamatory.

## Issues

1. Whether the First Amendment and California free-speech protections permit a permanent injunction barring repetition of specific statements after those statements have been adjudicated defamatory.
2. Whether the permanent injunction entered was constitutionally overbroad in scope and terms.

## Decision

- The California Supreme Court held that a properly tailored permanent injunction may prohibit repetition of statements specifically adjudicated defamatory and is not invalid merely because it restricts future speech.
- The Court held the trial court’s injunction was unconstitutional in part because it was overly broad.
- The Court reversed the Court of Appeal’s categorical invalidation of injunctive relief and remanded for entry of a narrower injunction consistent with constitutional limits.

## Legal Principles

- Defamatory speech is unprotected; after a full adjudication that specific statements are defamatory, a court may enjoin repetition of those statements as equitable relief.
- An injunction in a defamation case must be narrowly tailored and limited to the precise statements found defamatory; it may not reach “similar” or “related” statements not adjudicated false.
- Broad restraints that extend beyond preventing repetition of adjudicated defamatory statements—such as restrictions on contacting employees unrelated to the defamatory statements—impermissibly burden protected speech.
- Injunctive relief may bind only those shown to be involved in, or likely to participate in, the proscribed conduct; extending an order to unspecified “agents” or persons acting “in concert” without evidentiary support is overinclusive.
- Even when some injunctive relief is permitted, the order must be specific enough to allow continued lawful criticism and complaints that do not repeat the adjudicated defamatory factual assertions.

## Conclusion

A court may issue a permanent injunction barring repetition of specific statements after they have been adjudicated defamatory, but the injunction must be precisely drawn and confined to those statements; broader restrictions that sweep in unadjudicated speech or unrelated conduct are unconstitutional.


Balboa Island Vill. Inn, Inc. v. Lemen, 40 Cal. 4th 1141 (Cal. 2007)