Published Part Discusses Scope of Agricultural Trespass Fee-Shifting Statute, CCP § 1021.9.
CCP § 1021.9 provides: “In any action to recover damages to personal or real property resulting from trespassing on lands either under cultivation or intended or used for the raising of livestock, the prevailing plaintiff shall be entitled to reasonable attorney’s fees in addition to other costs, and in addition to any liability for damages imposed by law.”
In our March 25, 2020 post, we discussed the unpublished opinion in Kelly v. House, Case Nos. A153735/A153184 (1st Dist., Div. 1 Mar. 23, 2020). It determined that the trial court erred in not awarding statutory damages to prevailing plaintiffs under section 1021.9 where they proved that defendants trespassed and caused tangible property damage by boarding their own animals on farmable land, painting corrals, disk-plowed fields, applying prohibited pesticides, and cutting down oak/buckeye trees cultivated by plaintiffs, resulting in plaintiffs losing their certified organic status. We can now report that the statutory fee discussion section of the opinion was partially certified for publication on April 2, 2020.
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