22
damages for mental or emotional distress), and whatever other relief the court deems
appropriate. . . .” (Oakland Mun. Code, § 8.22.370, subd. (A)(2), brackets in original.)
As noted above, the filing of an unlawful detainer action and the service of a notice
to quit are acts arising from protected activity under the anti-SLAPP statute. “ ‘But the
mere fact an action was filed after protected activity took place does not mean it arose from
that activity.’ [Citation.] ‘Moreover, that a cause of action arguably may have been
“triggered” by protected activity does not entail that it is one arising from such. [Citation.]
In the anti-SLAPP context, the critical consideration is whether the cause of action is based
on the defendant’s protected free speech or petitioning activity. [Citations.]’ ” (Ulkarim v.
Westfield LLC (2014) 227 Cal.App.4th 1266, 1275; Clark, supra, 170 Cal.App.4th at
p. 1284.) The Just Cause Ordinance “permits a tenant to recover damages for . . . a range of
conduct that does not necessarily include filing a lawsuit to recover possession” (Rental
Housing Assn. of Northern Alameda County v. City of Oakland (2009) 171 Cal.App.4th
741, 767), and here Winslett chose to avoid basing her claim on the eviction itself. The
tenth cause of action focuses on the reasons Sagi “endeavor[ed] to recover possession” (see
Oakland Mun. Code, § 8.22.360, subds. (A), (B)(2)), not on the eviction proceedings. (See
Clark, supra, 170 Cal.App.4th at p. 1284 [allegation of fraud against landlord in suit by
tenant for retaliatory eviction, where landlord lied about his intent to move a relative into
rental unit subject to rent control and then evicted the tenant under the Ellis Act, thereby
allowing the rent to be raised to market level, does not arise out of anti-SLAPP protected
activity].)
Unlike her section 1942.5 claims as pleaded in the eighth and fifteenth causes of
action, Winslett grounds her tenth cause of action on Sagi’s retributive tactics prior to the
eviction proceedings. While Winslett’s section 1942.5 claims incorporate and replead all of
the background allegations in her first amended complaint, including paragraph 15—which
alleges the initiation of unlawful detainer proceedings as the culminating act—the
background allegations incorporated into her tenth cause of action omit that paragraph.
Sagi tries to argue around the careful framing of this claim by selectively focusing on a
vague reference in it to “misleading notices,” an allegation he contends can only refer to the