Matter Remanded To Reconsider Routine Costs Awardable To Plaintiff.
Sanford v. Rasnick, Case No. A145704 (1st Dist., Div. 2 Apr. 25, 2016) (published) involved a situation where plaintiff motorcyclist sued defendants owner/driver of a car. Defendants made a joint, unapportioned pretrial CCP § 998 offer of $130,000, but plaintiff recovered less after various offsets and pre-offer costs were factored into the equation. However, the trial judge awarded certain expert witness fees and costs to the defense based on the conclusion the 998 offer was valid and also disallowed certain routine costs to plaintiff as the prevailing party.
Both of the post-trial rulings were reversed on appeal.
As far as the award of expert and other costs to the defense was concerned, that went away because the 998 offer was invalid. Although asking for narrow releases relating to the case was within the proper ambit of 998, the defense request for a settlement agreement—with undefined, unexplained terms—was too broad in nature, leaving the plaintiff at having to guess about what was being asked for. The lower court’s deletion of mediation fees/expenses from the costs award to plaintiff was error because these are costs that can be awarded in the discretion of the court. However, the lower court never exercised its discretion because of the belief that mediation fees/expenses were not compensable, meaning a remand was necessary so discretion actually could be exercised one way or the other.