Substance Over Form Prevailed in this One.
Marriage of Sharples, Case No. E056941 (4th Dist., Div. 2 Jan. 22, 2014) (published) is a case where a lower court denied a wife’s needs-based request for provisional attorney’s fees and costs (with husband having a definably bigger cash flow/asset advantage) because she did not file Judicial Council Form FL-319, which has information needed to justify an attorney’s fees request.
This one was reversed on appeal.
The problem was that, even under former CRC 5.93 (now 5.427), the use of the form was not mandatory. Rather, there was another option: submission of comparable declarations addressing the items listed in the form. That is what ex-wife did, even though not using the mandatory form, such that her resort to the CRC option meant this one had to be reversed.
Comments