DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL OF FLORIDA

SECOND DISTRICT

JONATHAN KIERNAN GODWIN,

Petitioner,

v.

STEPHEN MICHELINI; JOHN DOE; and JANE DOE,

Respondents.

No. 2D22-4048

September 6, 2023

Petition for Writ of Certiorari to the Circuit Court for Hillsborough 

County; Cheryl Thomas, Judge.

Ryan D. Barack and Michell Erin Nadeau of Kwall Barack Nadeau PLLC, 

Clearwater, for Petitioner.

Ethan J. Loeb, Allison C. Doucette, Steven Gieseler, Nicholas M. Gieseler, 

and Elliot P. Haney of Bartlett, Loeb, Hinds & Thompson, PLLC, Tampa, 

for Respondent Stephen Michelini.

No appearance for remaining Respondents.

BLACK, Judge.

Jonathan Kiernan Godwin seeks a writ of certiorari quashing the 

trial court's order denying his motion to dismiss or for summary 

judgment filed pursuant to section 768.295, Florida Statutes (2021), 
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Florida's Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (Anti-SLAPP) 

statute. Because the trial court departed from the essential 

requirements of law by applying an incorrect motion-to-dismiss 

standard, we grant Mr. Godwin's petition and quash the order on review. 

Stephen Michelini filed a two-count defamation complaint against 

Mr. Godwin premised upon comments made by Mr. Godwin on 

Facebook. The Facebook comments were made in response to a January 

2022 Tampa Bay Times article posted by the Times on its Facebook page. 

The article concerned a lawsuit between Mr. Michelini and former Tampa 

City Councilman John Dingfelder, and Mr. Godwin's comments generally 

alleged that Mr. Michelini was corrupt and that he had acted in violation 

of Florida's Government in the Sunshine Law.1 In response to the 

lawsuit, Mr. Godwin filed his motion to dismiss or for summary 

judgment, alleging that the lawsuit violated Florida's Anti-SLAPP statute. 

Following a hearing, the trial court denied the motion to dismiss. As 

relevant to our resolution of this case, the court's findings included that 

it needed only to accept the allegations of the complaint as true and to 

determine whether they stated a cause of action and that although the 

Anti-SLAPP statute "permits a court to look beyond the four-corners of a 

complaint, that does not apply to a motion to dismiss." 

Relying on this court's opinions in Gundel v. AV Homes, Inc., 264 

So. 3d 304, 310 (Fla. 2d DCA 2019), and Davis v. Mishiyev, 339 So. 3d 

449, 452-53 (Fla. 2d DCA 2022), Mr. Godwin seeks certiorari review of 

1 Section 286.011, Florida Statutes, is "commonly known as the 

Government in the Sunshine Law." Sarasota Citizens For Responsible 

Gov't v. City of Sarasota, 48 So. 3d 755, 762 (Fla. 2010).
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the order, contending that the trial court applied an incorrect standard 

in denying the motion to dismiss.2 

This court has explained that "because a postjudgment appeal 

cannot remedy the very harm that the Anti-SLAPP statute seeks to 

prevent—unnecessary litigation—a petitioner clearly establishes 

irreparable harm when seeking review of an order denying a motion to 

dismiss under the Anti-SLAPP statute." Davis, 339 So. 3d at 452 (first 

citing Baird v. Mason Classical Acad., Inc., 317 So. 3d 264, 267-68 (Fla. 

2d DCA 2021); and then citing Gundel, 264 So. 3d at 311). Thus, in 

accordance with this district's case law, we conclude that the 

jurisdictional prongs of the certiorari standard have been met.

We next turn to whether the trial court departed from the essential 

requirements of law in denying Mr. Godwin's motion. Gundel and Davis

directly address the standard under which a trial court must consider a 

motion to dismiss filed pursuant to the Anti-SLAPP statute. In Gundel, 

we agreed with the petitioners that "the Anti-SLAPP statute requires the 

trial court to do more than accept as true the factual allegations in the 

four corners of the complaint and draw all reasonable inferences 

therefrom in favor of the claimant." 264 So. 3d at 314. The trial court 

must employ a burden-shifting analysis whereby the initial burden is on 

the SLAPP defendant to establish that the Anti-SLAPP statute applies, 

and once the defendant has done so, the burden shifts "to the claimant 

to demonstrate that the claims are not 'primarily' based on First 

2 The trial court treated the motion only as a motion to dismiss, 

finding that summary judgment was "inappropriate, as [Mr. Godwin] 

ha[d] submitted no supporting evidence." Although Mr. Godwin has 

argued that the court departed from the essential requirements of law in 

making that finding, we decline to address his argument.
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Amendment rights in connection with a public issue and not 'without 

merit.' " Id. And in Davis, we recognized the burden-shifting analysis 

established in Gundel and granted the petition for writ of certiorari, 

concluding that "the unelaborated order of dismissal suggests that the 

trial court denied the motion utilizing an incorrect motion-to-dismiss 

standard." 339 So. 3d at 453. 

The trial court's findings in this case demonstrate that it did not 

utilize this court's precedent addressing the language of section 768.295 

and setting forth the analysis to be utilized when reviewing motions to 

dismiss filed pursuant to Florida's Anti-SLAPP statute. Mr. Godwin has 

established that in applying an incorrect motion-to-dismiss standard, the 

trial court departed from the essential requirements of law.

Petition granted; order quashed.

MORRIS and SMITH, JJ., Concur.

Opinion subject to revision prior to official publication.