Plaintiff’s Request for Over $58,500 In Fees Is Firmly Rejected.
Labor Code section 218.5 holds that a prevailing party in an action for nonpayment of wages, fringe benefits, or health/welfare/pension fund contributions must be awarded reasonable attorney’s fees. It was that pesky word “reasonable” that resulted in a much diminished fee award than the winning plaintiff requested in a wage/hour lawsuit.
In Cochran v. El Cajon Motors, Case No. D055390 (4th Dist., Div. 1 Sept. 21, 2010) (unpublished), plaintiff sued for wage/hour waiting time penalties under Labor Code section 203. He sued in unlimited jurisdiction civil court (more than $25,000 at stake), even though his complaint only pled penalties and interest of a little over $13,000. After a two-hour bench trial, the trial court awarded plaintiff $3,289.00 in waiting time penalties.
That is where the fun begins for us bloggers. Plaintiff then sought an eventual fee award under the mandatory fee-shifting statute of $58,590 plus costs (bringing the total amount sought to $61.427.25, factoring in costs). The trial court awarded plaintiff $7,475 in fees and set a hearing to determine what routine costs should be awarded, if any. Plaintiff appealed.
He lost.
C’mon, said the appellate court in essence. You, the plaintiff, should have brought this as a limited civil case ($25,000 or less at stake) such that the trial judge could have denied fees altogether but has broad discretion on what is ultimately awarded. (Code Civ. Proc., § 1033(a).) Beyond that, the fee award was no abuse of discretion; after all, the fee recovery was more than twice the amount of plaintiff’s penalty recovery and the trial judge believed the case to be straightforward such that the amount requested was not in order.
With respect to the costs order, appellant argued that additional costs should have been included in the judgment. The problem here was that the trial court never reached the issue because there was no ruling on the motion to tax costs and appellant never filed any motion to amend the cost bill.
The opinion does not mention how much defendant spent on attorney’s fees. Would the amount of plaintiff’s fees be any less unreasonable if defendant spent more?