Relatively Small Class Of Individuals Involved, Plus An Attenuated Public Interest, Justified Denial Of Fees.
In Villarreal v. Gordon, Case No. B291027 (2d Dist., Div. 1 Dec. 19, 2019) (unpublished), certified for publication on January 10, 2020, a petitioner prevailed on a mandate writ petition by which the DMV was not going to give effect to his Arizona DUI conviction under a Driver License Compact between California and other states to identify out-of-state DUIs if certain conditions are met. Petitioner then sought $240,459.72 in attorney’s fees under the private attorney general statute. The lower court denied the request, reasoning that the benefit affected a reasonably small class of persons with multiple drunk driving convictions in California and other states and that the avoidance of increased sanctions for out-of-state convictions was not the type of public benefit to be vindicated under section 1021.5.
The 2/1 DCA affirmed, agreeing with the conclusions of the lower court. Indeed, after reviewing the record below, the appellate court also found that petitioner could not competently prove the number of persons who were benefitted by the judgment below.