In our October 19, 2009 post, we reported on the $20,000 sanctions award imposed against Orly Taitz by U.S. District Judge Clay D. Land in one of the “birther” cases. We can now report that the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the sanctions order, finding the arguments on appeal to be “unpersuasive” in […]
Second District, Division 2 Finds Objective Test Governs Fee Recovery Under False Claims Act. California’s False Claims Act has a fee-shifting provision, stating that a court may award a prevailing defendant its reasonable attorney’s fees and expenses against a state or political subdivision that proceeds with a false claim for payment claim if the
Even though facing a budget shortfall of more than $116 million, the City of San Jose did not get good news in litigation with COMPAC, the San Jose Silicon Valley Chamber of Commerce’s political action committee, over the constitutionality of the City’s $250 limit on individual contributions in raising money for campaign mailers (known
Goodman Forecast to Curtain Attorney’s Fees In a March 15, 2010 article “Curtailing Attorneys’ Fees” by Harry I. Price (a Los Altos real estate attorney) published in The Recorder, Mr. Price predicts that Goodman v. Lozano—a recent California Supreme Court decision examined in our February 5, 2010 post—“will change how litigants sift and
Lower Court Can Evaluate Factor Under Traditional Analysis, Not Having to Use More Nuanced L.A. Police Protective League Test—Especially Where Nuanced Test Not Raised Below. This next one goes to show you that waiver can be a bitter bill to swallow—make sure you raise potential winning back-up arguments before the trial court or risk
15% Reduction Justified Because Monthly Receiver Reports Might Have Resulted in Possible Fee Savings, Says Second District, Division 7 Here is an interesting one for all of you attorneys representing receivers. The lesson to be learned is direct and simple: make sure they discharge basic fiduciary responsibilities of filing monthly reports, or face possible
First District, Division 1 Confronts Novel Procedural Circumstance in Unpublished Opinion. Our intermediate California appellate courts confront some very interesting cases in which two statutory schemes collide in unusual procedural settings. The next one involves a collision between Code of Civil Procedure section 998 (California’s pretrial offer of judgment statute) and Code of Civil
As reported by Fred Swegles in “Law on fees could help or hurt San Clemente” (an article published in the March 12, 2010 The Orange County Register), San Clemente, CA is looking to update a local law to force the losing party in a code enforcement action to pay attorney’s fees. Based on
Fourth District, Division 3 Remands Fee Recovery Under Unusual Procedural Circumstances. Here is an interesting decision with a procedural twist—with apologies to Chubby Checker (oh, boy, are we dating ourselves). Chubby Checker does the Twist. In Nguyen v. Dang, Case Nos. G041224/G041380 (4th Dist., Div. 3 Mar. 11, 2010) (unpublished), a signatory
Although Not a Fees Issue, Decision Is Of Interest to All California Litigators. For all you litigators out there, every wonder if signing “APPROVED AS TO FORM AND CONTENT” language in a settlement agreement might result in exposure to a person other than your client (especially an opposing counsel)? An opposing counsel sued on
