James F. Haggerty, President and CEO of PRCG, was recently mentioned in an article in Los Angeles Magazine for his involvement in the Blake Lively/Wayfarer/Justin Baldoni case. Haggerty served as an expert witness for the defense, preparing a report that described the hiring of a crisis communications firm in the face of reputational risk as an accepted, ethical, and standard practice to mitigate potential issues in the media, in social media, and before other key audiences.

An attorney, author and consultant, Haggerty is also an adjunct law professor teaching a course entitled “Advocacy in the Court of Public Opinion.” He is the author of two books that have become mainstays in the crisis and litigation communications field: In the Court of Public Opinion: Winning Strategies for Litigation Communications (originally published in 2003; Hart + Harvest Press Third Edition, 2022) and Chief Crisis Officer: Structure and Leadership for Effective Communications Response (originally published in 2017; Hart + Harvest Paperback Edition, 2023).

The Court in the Lively/Baldoni case echoed Haggerty’s views, stating in an April 2, 2026, decision on the Plaintiffs Motion for Summary Judgment (MSJ):

The Wayfarer Parties [Defendants] were entitled to engage public relations and crisis management specialists to protect their reputations. Just as no reasonable employee should expect that the employer-defendant would simply surrender in the face of litigation, a reasonable employee in a public-facing industry would not expect an employer to refrain from hiring crisis-communications professionals to be protected against negative attacks.

The Wayfarer Parties were also entitled to prepare responses to the Protections Letter and the accusations that it implied. That included the right to assert that the claims against them were untrue or misconstrued, and that Lively [the Plaintiff] could not be credited. It also included the right to convey to the viewing public reasons why Lively’s account could not be trusted, including pointing to evidence that Lively had ulterior motives for making claims of harassment and that she did not believe the claims she was making.

Furthermore, Lively has cited no support for the proposition that a person publicly accused of serious misconduct cannot use proxies—both disclosed and undisclosed —to defend him or herself. For example, it was permissible for [Defendant] Baldoni to request that the digital team “boost” certain videos which he believed were favorable to his image, and . . . to work behind the scenes to emphasize his “stellar reputation among colleagues and industry peers,” including the fact that he was “a longtime activist and advocate for women in Hollywood,” and to tone down inflammatory allegations against him. The Wayfarer Parties similarly would have been within their rights in elevating stories that would cast doubt on whether Lively was a credible reporter of the events that occurred on the set.

Lively v. Wayfarer Studios LLC, No. 24-cv-10049, 2026 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 73061 (S.D.N.Y. Apr. 2, 2026) [cites and some internal quotes omitted].

The case settled shortly thereafter.

The full article can be found here.