Damages

In a personal injury action, a plaintiff must, before entry of a default serve the defendant with a statement of damages by the same means as the plaintiff served the summons and complaint.  Here, service by publication had been authorized.  Plaintiff could and did properly serve the statement of damages by publication without an additional order permitting service of the… Read More

Civ. Code 3287(b) gives the trial judge broad discretionary power to award prejudgment interest in contract cases even when the damages are not certain or capable of being made certain.  Uncertainty of damages alone would not be a proper reason to deny discretionary prejudgment interest under section 3287(b), but here, the trial judge also relied on the fact that the… Read More

The trial court properly admitted HP's expert's lost profits opinion.  Unlike the plaintiff in Sargon Enterprises, Inc. v. University of Southern California (2012) 55 Cal.4th 747, HP was an established business.  The expert had based his opinion on HP's past performance data and considered multiple variables including new product offerings by competing manufacturers.  The expert's projection of lost profits five… Read More

Oracle breached its contract with HP by announcing that its next product releases would not be compatible with HP's Itanium computers.  Following the first phase of trial in this case, the trial court concluded that the parties' contract required Oracle to offer Itanium-compatible versions of its product releases.  Oracle then announced that it would release Itanium-compatible versions, but also announced… Read More

This decision contains a lengthy discussion of requirements contracts and how they should be interpreted.  The only appealed issue was the amount of damages that plaintiff should recover for the defendant's breach of the contract.  The trial court had limited damages to a three month period before trial; whereas, the plaintiff sought damages for the entire period after the defendant… Read More

California follows Rest.2d Torts sec. 920 in allowing a reduction of a plaintiff's damages if the defendant's tortious conduct has conferred a special benefit on the plaintiff as well as damaging the plaintiff.  But the reduction is permitted only to the extent it is equitable to reduce damages.  In weighing the equities, the court can consider not only whether the… Read More

Molfetta was White's criminal defense lawyer.  After White was convicted, he requested Molfetta's files so he could prepare habeas corpus petitions.  Molfetta failed to turn over the files.  While some of the files were confidential and could not be turned over, most were not and should have been timely provided once White requested them.  While condemning Molfetta's actions, this decision… Read More

A new trial motion based on excessive damages must be made on the "minutes of the court."  Unlike a new trial motion for juror misconduct, the excessive damage new trial motion may not be based on, and the trial court may not consider, evidence not admitted before the jury during the trial--such as in this case, the defendant's chart of… Read More

The district court did not err in reducing punitive damages against Monsanto for failure to warn of cancer risks from Roundup to a ratio of 3.8 to 1 to actual damages, though that ratio was on the borderline of being excessive.  The harm caused was physical, yet the jury awarded plaintiff $5 million in actual damages, 96% of which was… Read More

Plaintiff successfully sued defendant for violating a conservation easement on his property.  The trial court awarded plaintiff $2.9 million in attorney fees for five years of hard-fought litigation and a 19-day trial.  This decision affirms the award.  Plaintiff could recover fees for all hours spent by its attorneys though the first $500,000 in fees was paid for by its insurance. … Read More

The triall court abused its discretion in denying plaintiff's request for an award of fees under CCP 2033.420(a) for proving facts stated in requests for admission that the defendant had wrongly denied.  None of the grounds the trial court stated were supported by the evidence.  Nor was the plaintiff required to allocate its fees to specific requests that defendant had… Read More

Disagreeing with Villacorta v. Cemex Cement, Inc. (2013) 221 Cal.App.4th 1425, this decision holds that income a wrongfully terminated employee earns from another job after termination must be subtracted from her past economic damages for the wrongful termination whether or not the subsequent employment was not comparable or substantially similar to the job that was wrongfully terminated.  The comparable or… Read More

In determining whether a defendant's tortious conduct was the proximate cause of plaintiff's damage, the court must view the general set of circumstances not the particular facts of the case.  So, here, the defendant escrow company's negligence in closing an escrow for the sale of a house led foreseeably to the seller's incurring damages in the form of attorney fees… Read More

In a transactional legal malpractice case arising from the defendant lawyer's advising plaintiff to enter into two marketing contracts that conflicted with each other, the plaintiff had to show only that the lawyer's negligent advice was a substantial factor in causing her loss.  This she did at least sufficiently to overcome summary judgment by showing that she was considering not… Read More

In a construction dispute that originally was over $22,096, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in awarding plaintiff only $90,000 in attorney fees out of the $292,140 requested.  The case was relatively simple, ultimately turning on the contractor's lack of a license and proper insurance.  It involved only money, so it was reasonable to compare fees against recovery… Read More

A request for nominal damages satisfies the redressability element of standing where a plaintiff’s claim is based on a completed violation of a legal right.  For the purpose of Article III standing, nominal damages provide the necessary redress for a past, completed violation of a legal right. Read More

Following n Hill v. Superior Court (2016) 244 Cal.App.4th 1281 and Kerley v. Weber (2018) 27 Cal.App.5th 1187, and disagreeing with Levin v. Winston-Levin (2019) 39 Cal.App.5th 1025, this decision holds that double damages may be awarded under Probate Code 859 without a finding of bad faith if the defendant has taken or concealed property of a dependent adult, a… Read More

Plaintiff contracted mesothelioma, allegedly from asbestos-concrete pipe manufactured by defendant, a successor to Johns Manville's asbestos-concrete business.  A $15 million punitive damage award is reversed for lack of evidence that an officer, director or managing agent of defendant acted with malice, oppression or fraud or authorized or ratified any conduct.  Romo v. Ford Motor Co. (2002) 99 Cal.App.4th 1115 doesn't… Read More

In building a house on his own property, defendant severed roots of a large pine tree that was partly on defendant's property and partly on plaintiff's.  Following Scholes v. Lambirth Trucking Co. (2020) 8 Cal.5th 1094, this decision holds that plaintiff can recover only single damages for killing the pine tree.  The injury to the tree occurred from severing roots… Read More

Jury verdict that car did not have "a window defect that rendered it unfit for the ordinary purpose of providing transportation" should have ended the jury's task on the plaintiff's claim for breach of implied warranty.  But due to an error in the jury verdict form, the jury went on to award plaintiff damages.  Held, the trial court correctly granted… Read More