Special Fee Shifting Statute: County’s Adherence To Privileges And Exemptions Until Last Moment Did Not Prevent California Public Records Act Petitioner From Receiving Prevailing Party Attorney’s Fees

Petitioner Was A Catalyst For Production Of Requested Documents.

            California Public Records Act has a fee-shifting statute in favor of a prevailing party petitioner under Government Code section 6259(d), one which is liberally construed in order to encourage governmental entities to produce documents to the public except for ones which fall under certain restrictions/exemptions.  In Saint-Fleur v. County of Fresno, Case No. F075060 (5^th Dist. July 15, 2019) (unpublished), plaintiff was declared the prevailing party and awarded fees against County, after the lower court ordered County to produce certain public records.  County claimed that it had produced documents in response to previous litigation, but the record showed that it had claimed privileges/exemptions and only at the eleventh hour confirmed that the documents ordered to be produced had indeed been produced in other litigation.  The Fifth District found the fee award appropriate given that petitioner could not have known this and was the catalyst for County’s confirmation about the nature of the responsive documents.