Addition Of Costs Did Not Divest Trial Judge Of Jurisdiction To Consider Motion And Lower Court Did Not Abuse Its Discretion By Not Apportioning Costs.
Well, folks, we are a blessed country by having a court system open to all litigants, rich or poor. However, that does not mean that jurists do not get fed up with litigants who fight over everything. In Banyan Limited Partnership v. Baer, Case No. G051282 (4th Dist., Div. 3 Aug. 17, 2016) (unpublished), the appellate court dealt with a nonprevailing party’s appeal of a lower court decision denying its motion to tax costs. But it noted in the first paragraph of the opinion that this was the sixth appeal before it after two writ petitions and five prior appeals.
The 4/3 DCA panel, in a decision authored by Presiding Justice O’Leary, affirmed the denial of the motion to tax costs.
After noting there was a split of authority on whether an order taxing costs or denying a motion of tax costs is an appealable order, the panel sided with Krikorian Premiere Theatres, LLC v. Westminster Central, LLC, 193 Cal.App.4th 1075, 1083-1085 (2011) [discussed in our March 25, 2011 post], which found that a ruling denying a motion to tax costs is appealable.
The appellate court next rebuffed the argument that the trial court’s addition of costs to an existing judgment somehow constituted an impermissible modification of the judgment divesting the lower court of the ability to so add costs.
Appellant also argued that some costs should have been taxed, but both the trial and appellate courts found that appellant had failed to shift the burden to the defendants to show the claimed costs were reasonable and necessary. Furthermore, no abuse of discretion occurred from failing to apportion costs among jointly represented defendants, because this would simply be a numerical across-the-board reduction which is infirm under Charton v. Harkey, 247 Cal.App.4th 730, 744-745 (2016) [discussed in our May 24, 2016 post].
BLOG EXTRA—The 1/5 DCA, in an unpublished opinion, also agreed with Krikorian on the costs appealability issue. (See Williams v. Safire, Case No. A132145 (1st Dist., Div. 5 Feb. 28, 2013 [discussed in our March 2, 2013 post].)