Civil Code 1708.85 authorizes an action by a person who has distributed a private photo or other reproduction of the plaintiff engaging in a sex act or of the plaintiff’s private parts. The suit may be brought in a pseudonym to protect the plaintiff’s privacy. (Civ. Code 1708.85(f).) Here, the court clerk improperly posted on the court’s website a copy of the confidential Judicial Council form MC-125, which revealed the plaintiff’s true name. Instead, of ordering the clerk to remove the document from the website, the trial court held that there was no longer any reason to protect the plaintiff’s privacy and so ordered future filings to be in plaintiff’s real name. This decision reverses that determination. The trial court should instead have corrected its clerk’s error, taken down the website posting, and allowed plaintiff to proceed by pseudonym.
California Court of Appeal, Second District, Division 1 (Chaney, J.); September 29, 2016; 2016 WL 5462947