You Agree To Arbitrate, You Take What The Arbitrator Gives You. Tenant winning an arbitration against landlord under a commercial lease, containing arbitration and attorney’s fees clauses, was miffed when the arbitrator also determined that each party was to bear its own costs and fees. Tenant appealed in Setareh v. Bierer, Case No. […]
Who Says Arbitration Cannot Be Costly? Not Us. This next illustrates that arbitrations can be costly affairs. In Kent v. The Wine Group, LLC, Case No. A145104 (1st Dist., Div. 1 Aug. 19, 2016) (unpublished), former CEO who did grow the company in extraordinary fashion filed an arbitration demand against his former
Eric S. Blum And David J. Hesseltine Provide Some Tips On What Fee Arbitrators Focus On In Mandatory Fee Arbitrations. Under the Mandatory Fee Arbitration Act (Bus. & Prof. Code, § 6200 et seq.), attorneys and clients must first arbitrate a fee dispute through a local county bar’s fee arbitration process unless that
Merits Cannot Be Reviewed, But Prevailing Counterclaimant Did Not Allocate—A Mistake! We will say that Editions Limited West, Inc. v. Somerset Studios, Inc., Case No. A145320 (1st Dist., Div. 3 July 7, 2016) (unpublished) is another decision where an appellate court would not revisit the merits of an arbitrator’s refusal to grant fees
Unpublished Case Counsels Care In What You Include In A Complaint, If Your Opponent Fails To Time Respond And Suffers A Default Judgment. Cox, Castle & Nicholson, LLP v. Wan, Case No. B262017 (2d Dist., Div. 5 June 23, 2016) (unpublished) is an interesting 2-1 decision in a case involving a plaintiff law
Does A Court Stay On Litigation Get Lifted When A Party Is Unable To Pay Ongoing Costs Of An Arbitration? On June 15, 2016, Co-contributor Marc posted in the California Mediation and Arbitration blog about Tillman v. Rheingold Firm, No. 13-56624 (9th Cir. 6/15/16), a Ninth Circuit Case addressing what happens to a district
Dealt With MFAA Arbitrator Disclosure Issues, Mainly. On May 20, 2016, we posted on the unpublished decision of Baxter v. Bock, a mandatory fee arbitration case which decided that an arbitrator auditing fee bills did not have to disclose this work in the arbitration given that he represented both plaintiffs and defendants in
Arbitrator Auditing Attorney’s Bills Did Not Have To Disclose Work Where Audits Did Not Favor Plaintiffs Or Defendants From Overall Practice Skill Set. In Baxter v. Bock, Case Nos. A142372 et al. (1st Dist., Div. 1 May 18, 2016) (unpublished), former attorney and ex-client engaged in a mandatory fee arbitration under the Mandatory
On March 25, 2016, the Committee on Mandatory Fee Arbitration released two new Advisories that impact attorney’s fees issues: (1) “Statute of Limitations For Fee Arbitrations”; (2) “Analysis Of Potential Bill Padding And Other Billing Issues”. For more information, link to co-contributor Marc’s post today about the two Advisories on California Mediation and
Justice Rubin, In A Long Dissent, Concludes Otherwise. Safarian Choi & Bolstad, LLP v. Minassian, Case No. B262526 (2d Dist., Div. 8 Apr. 7, 2016) (unpublished) involved an ex-client who lost a mandatory fee arbitration to his ex-attorneys. Among other challenges to the arbitration award, ex-client raised the argument that the arbitration panel
