Code of Civil Procedure sections 881-883 create an added remedy for one judgment debtor to recover contribution from other joint judgment debtors who are not joint tortfeasors to recover contribution and who have not paid their proportionate part of the judgment. This decision holds that the party seeking contribution does not bear any burden of pleading or proving that its application for contribution is timely. Moreover, to be timely, the application need only be filed before the judgment creditor files an acknowledgement of full satisfaction of the judgment. Here, $1,350 in awarded costs of collecting the judgment remained unpaid when the application for contribution was filed and no satisfaction of judgment had been recorded. Hence, the application was timely.
California Court of Appeal, Fourth District, Division Three (Ikola, J.); October 20, 2017; 2017 WL 4707743.