The lawsuit stems from a 2024 incident that occurred on the campus of Beverly Hills High School following the presidential election. (Beverly Press/Park Labrea News file photo)

On June 24, a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge denied an anti-SLAPP motion filed by former Beverly Hills High School journalism teacher Romeo Carey, allowing defamation claims made by former Beverly Hills Unified School District administrator Mark Mead against Carey to move forward.

California’s anti-SLAPP law allows defendants to seek early dismissal of lawsuits arising from constitutionally protected speech. However, judge Michael E. Whitaker ruled that Mead presented sufficient evidence to show his claims have at least “minimal merit,” the legal standard required for the case to proceed.

The June 24 ruling does not determine whether Mead’s allegations are ultimately true. Instead, it allows the claims against Carey to continue through the litigation process.

Mead’s lawsuit names Carey, Beverly Hills Unified School District and several current and former district officials as defendants. The June 24 ruling addressed only Carey’s request to dismiss the claims against him under California’s anti-SLAPP law.

The lawsuit stems from November 2024 broadcasts produced by KBEV, Beverly Hills High School’s student-run television news program, which alleged Mead, then the district’s executive director of school safety, choked a student while responding to a pro-Trump post-election student demonstration on the school campus. Mead alleges the broadcasts contained “doctored” video footage and ultimately led to his demotion. He remains employed by BHUSD as a middle school English teacher, but alleges in the lawsuit that the reassignment reduced his annual salary by approximately $66,000.

While the court agreed the KBEV broadcasts involved protected speech on a matter of public interest, it found Mead had demonstrated a probability of prevailing on his claims at the current preliminary stage.

In denying the motion, Whitaker wrote that his review of the evidence indicated the KBEV footage “appears to be slowed down and probably altered to make it seem like [Mead] is strangling the student.” The ruling contrasted that footage with district security camera video, which the court said appeared to show Mead using open hands to separate students and making contact with the student for only “a second or two” while dispersing the crowd.

The court also rejected Carey’s argument that there was insufficient evidence connecting him personally to publication of the broadcasts. Whitaker cited declarations alleging Carey, as the school’s journalism teacher and KBEV’s executive producer, reviewed and approved student stories before publication and possessed professional video-editing expertise. The court found Mead established sufficient evidence that Carey “probably had personal involvement in the publishing of the allegedly defamatory video and student news story.”

Mead’s attorney, Morgan Ricketts, Partner at Hadsell Stormer Renick & Dai, welcomed the ruling.

“This ruling is such an important vindication for Mark, and we’re thankful the judge saw through the anti-SLAPP motion and allowed the suit to go forward,” Ricketts said. “It should be noted that Romeo Carey’s argument was that Mark’s claim should be dismissed because it was theoretically possible Romeo published the rumor without knowing it was false. Interestingly, Romeo chose not to actually testify that he published it innocently.”

Because the defamation claim survived, the court also allowed Mead’s related negligence, intentional infliction of emotional distress and Labor Code claims against Carey to proceed. Whitaker also denied Carey’s request for attorney’s fees.

Carey and his attorneys did not respond to a request for comment by press time.

Following KBEV’s reporting on the alleged assault in late 2024, Carey was placed on paid administrative leave for approximately three months before being reinstated. During that time, many students, parents and the ACLU of Southern California argued the district’s actions amounted to retaliation and censorship. For months, KBEV students and their parents urged the BHUSD Board of Education to reinstate Carey and investigate Mead during public meetings. Amid the controversy, Superintendent Michael Bregy resigned.

Following Bregy’s resignation, the district retained the law firm Best Best & Krieger to investigate the incident. The investigation concluded the allegations that Mead assaulted a student were not substantiated. Following the investigation, Mead was reassigned from executive director of school safety to a middle school English teaching position. Mead alleges in the lawsuit that the reassignment constituted an unlawful demotion.

Mead’s lawsuit argues the district’s independent investigation “exacerbated the problem” because investigators did not interview students who were in close proximity to the incident and because school security footage which Mead argued contradicted the allegations against him was never publicly released by the district.

“The BHUSD’s internal investigation closed with the words ‘not sustained.’ I have always believed those words were chosen to obscure rather than illuminate,” Mead said in a June 30 statement. “A Los Angeles Superior Court judge has now found that the facts deserve to be seen and the truth revealed.”

The Beverly Press previously sought the security footage at the center of the lawsuit through a California Public Records Act request. Although the district provided the footage, it was heavily blurred to the point that the incident itself could not be seen, leaving the KBEV report as the only publicly available video depicting the encounter.

The lawsuit references the Beverly Press’ public records request, alleging Mead and another district security employee initially prepared video clips that blurred surrounding students to protect their privacy while leaving the interaction itself visible. According to the complaint, Superintendent Michael Bregy later instructed Mead to further edit the footage by blurring every individual shown. Mead alleges the resulting video was rendered unusable and created the impression that the district believed he had assaulted the student.

Mead’s attorneys also provided the Beverly Press with copies of both the KBEV broadcast and the district security footage referenced in the ruling. In both videos, Mead appears to make physical contact with the student during the encounter. Whether the KBEV footage accurately portrays that interaction remains a central issue in the lawsuit.

Carey retired from BHUSD in June 2025, about two months after being reinstated. Since then, the district has ended KBEV’s longtime role in producing the live public broadcast of Board of Education meetings, instead launching a district-operated livestream with comments disabled. Students previously said the broadcasts provided valuable real-world journalism experience. The KBEV studio has also since been demolished as part of campus renovations, and the future of the student journalism program remains unclear.