Painter v. Francis Realty, Inc., Case No. C078106 (3d Dist. Oct. 6, 2015) (Unpublished)—Allocation.
After reversing the fee award and remanding to see if apportionment was required between tort and contract claims under Civil Code section 1717 (with only contract claims compensable under section 1717), the trial judge determined the tort and contract claims were “inextricably intertwined” such that apportionment was not required in the case, a determination affirmed on appeal. Success on the contractual declaratory relief claim depended on defeating the tort fraud and improper foreclosure claims, which the defense did with the result it won $41,350 fees against losing plaintiff for work on both contract and tort claims.
Williams v. Chino Valley Independent Fire Dist., Case No. E055755 (4th Dist., Div. 2 Oct. 6, 2015) (Unpublished)—Civil Rights; Costs.
In this one, the appellate court remanded to the trial court to make findings on whether the losing civil rights plaintiff was subject to routine costs because plaintiff’s suit was frivolous/unreasonable/without basis as required by the state supreme court decision to this effect in Williams, 61 Cal.4th 97 (2015) [discussed in our May 4, 2015 post] and in light of the remand directive in Roman v. BRE Properties, Inc., 237 Cal.App.4th 1040 (2015) [discussed in our June 27, 2015 post]. So, this one went back for a re-do given the wrong standard was used by the trial judge in assessing costs against the non-victorious plaintiff.