First District’s Reversal Wipes Out $1,969,000 Fee Award to Plaintiffs.
Reversal of a merits judgment has a legal tsunami effect—it can also wipe out a substantial fee award to the ex-prevailing party. That is what happened in the next case we review.
In Turner v. Assn. of American Med. Colleges, Case No. A117071 (1st Dist., Div. 5 Oct. 30, 2008) (certified for publication), plaintiffs, individually and on behalf of a class, had won a trial court determination that disabled individuals taking standardized tests (specifically, the Medical College Admissions Test) are entitled to additional accommodations under the Unruh Act and Disabled Persons Act, with the Unruh Act having a mandatory fee-shifting provision under Civil Code section 55. As a result of the win, plaintiffs were awarded $1,969,000 in attorney’s fees and costs under Civil Code section 55, broken down as (1) $1,884,247 in base fees (based on a lodestar of $1,449,421 times a 1.3 multiplier), (2) $60,000 in fees for the fee motion, and (3) $25,489.05 in costs. Losing defendant appealed.
Losing defendant won, with the appellate court concluding that state law does not require testing accommodations for reading-related disabilities.
This also meant that the fee award was reversed. (See Moreno v. Sanchez, 106 Cal.App.4th 1405, 1437 n. 75.) The case illustrates the big swings that can occur when a cause is reversed on appeal.