Year In Review 2017 - Part I of 2

Year End Wrap-Up:  Mike & Marc’s Top 20 Decisions In 2017

Part 1 of 2 – 2017 Saw Decisions On Wide Spectrum Of Fees/Costs Issues.

            As we have done in past years, wishing all readers the happiest of holidays, we now present our top 20 published decisions from California appellate courts, the United States Supreme Court (SCOTUS), and the Ninth Circuit for the 2017 year.  This list is not meant to slight other important decisions in certain areas, but these are the ones that “rose to the top” from our perspective.  The number of ranking is not geared at all to the decision’s relative importance, and we do not mean to overlook other published decisions—not to mention the wealth of unpublished decisions on fees/costs issues which we reviewed in 2017.   Here we go on the first 10, with the remaining selections to be reviewed in a post before the end of this year:

20. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY – Perfect 10, Inc. v. Giganews, Inc., 847 F.3d 657 (9^th Cir. Jan. 23, 2017) – authored by Circuit Judge Nelson; discussed in our Jan. 28, 2017 post: Appellate court affirmed copyright fee award of $5.2 million, determining that defendants beating plaintiff’s claims equally vindicate copyright policies as plaintiffs who are successful in such cases.

19. SLAPP – Barry v. State Bar of California, 2 Cal.5^th 318 (Cal. Supreme Court Jan. 5, 2017) – authored by Justice Kruger; discussed in our Jan. 13, 2017 post: Prevailing SLAPP defendant entitled to mandatory SLAPP fee recovery when the defense prevailed on a lack of subject matter basis.

18. REQUESTS FOR ADMISSIONS – Rhule v. WaveFront Technology, Inc., 8 Cal.App.5^th 1223 (2d Dist., Div. 5 Feb. 23, 2017) – authored by Justice Baker; discussed in our Feb. 24, 2017 post:

Trial judges have discretion to award attorney’s fees to party allowed leave to correct request for admission responses under CCP § 2033.330 as a condition of allowing withdrawal of the mistaken responses.

17. COSTS/UNDERTAKING – Quiles v. Parent, 10 Cal.App.5^th 130 (4^th Dist., Div. 3 Mar. 37, 2017) – authored by the Court (Leary, P.J., Fybel, J., & Ikola, J.); discussed in our Mar. 27, 2017 post:

Judgment debtor satisfying compensatory damages component of judgment does not have to file an undertaking/bond for the just the remaining fees/costs components of a judgment, relying on CCP § 917.1(d) but inviting legislative amendment on the issue.

16. PRIVATE ATTORNEY GENERAL – Save Our Heritage Organisation v. City of San Diego, 11 Cal.App.5^th 154 (4^th Dist., Div. 1 Apr. 27, 2017) – authored by Presiding Justice McConnell; discussed in our Apr. 27, 2017 post: Appellate court affirmed a fee denial of a fee request leveled against a project opponent attempting to vindicate legal/environmental concerns, also determining that a project proponent is not disqualified from seeking CCP § 1021.5 fees.

15. SECTION 1717 – Dispute.Suite.com v. Scoreinc.com, 2 Cal.5th 968 (Cal. Supreme Court Apr. 6, 2017) – authored by Justice Werdegar; discussed in our Apr. 11, 2017 post: Civil Code section 1717 fees properly denied where prevailing litigant obtained a forum selection transfer and the other side refiled suit in foreign state, finding prevailing party determination was premature.

14. DAMAGES – Monster, LLC v. Superior Court, 12 Cal.App.5^th 1214 (2d Dist., Div. 7 June 21, 2017) – authored by Acting Presiding Justice Zelon; discussed in our June 22, 2017 post: Attorney’s fees recoverable as damages, not just costs, must be pled and proven at trial unless parties stipulate otherwise, with trial jury right protections at issue.

13. FAMILY LAW – Webb v. Webb, 12 Cal.App.5^th 876 (2d Dist., Div. 8 June 13, 2017) – authored by Justice Rubin; discussed in our June 14, 2017 post: Family Code section 271 sanctions can only be awarded to parties in a case, rather than their attorneys.

12. ARBITRATION/SECTION 998 – Heimlich v. Shivji, 12 Cal.App.5th 152 (6th Dist. May 31, 2017), rev. granted, No. S243029: California Supreme Court has framed the issue for review this way – “When a party to an arbitration proceeding makes an offer of compromise pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 998 and obtains a result in the arbitration more favorable to it than that offer, how, when, and from whom does that party request costs as provided under section 998?”  [Court of Appeal held that no pre-merits ruling alert should be made to arbitrator, but section 998 cost-shifting issue must be presented to arbitrator so a supplemental award, one way or the other, can be issued by arbitrator.]  We posted on June 14, 2017.

11. EMPLOYMENT – Shames v. Utility Consumers’ Action Network, 13 Cal.App.5^th 29 (4^th Dist., Div. 1 June 29, 2017) – authored by Justice Aaron; discussed in our July 4, 2017 post: Litigant in wage hour nonpayment action needs to specifically plead Labor Code section 218.5 recovery in either original or amended complaint/answer.

        To go to Part 2 of our Year In Review Wrap-Up for 2017, click here.