Settlement

Under the “pragmatic approach” to determine who is the prevailing party for purposes of statutory attorney fee awards, the question is whether by filing suit, the plaintiff achieved a better result than the defendant's last pre-suit offer of settlement. Read More

Defendant’s 998 offer was not rendered ambiguous by its attempt to “exclude reasonable costs and attorney fees if any”; so when plaintiff refused the offer and then recovered less than the offer at trial, the trial court could award cost and fee sanctions. Read More

Sanctions were improperly awarded under CCP 128.7 since plaintiffs’ suit was not frivolous; they had a nonfrivolous argument that their agreement to settle a prior action did not release the defendants in this follow-on suit. Read More

A joint offer by two plaintiffs was effective to allow enhanced cost recovery under Code of Civil Procedure section 998 when one plaintiff recovered more than the joint offer, thus establishing with certainty that the recovery was more favorable than the rejected joint offer. Read More

Defendant’s Rule 68 offer of judgment resulted in a binding contract whereby plaintiff was to receive reasonable attorney fees to be awarded by the court; consequently, court could not revisit whether fee award was permitted, only what sum would be reasonable.   Read More

Cy pres award in class action settlement was proper, even though defendant had given donations in the past to some of the cy pres recipients and plaintiff's counsel were alumni of the recipient institutions.   Read More

If a defendant in a Fair Employment and Housing Act lawsuit makes a section 998 offer that the plaintiff rejects and does not improve upon at trial, the defendant may recover its costs under section 998 notwithstanding the normal rule that a defendant cannot recover costs against the plaintiff in a FEHA action unless the action was objectively without foundation.… Read More

Defendant could not get a settlement agreement invalidated by claiming plaintiff United States had committed fraud on the court, since the later-discovered information on which defendant relied either didn't show fraud at all or only filled in details of fraud that defendant suspected before it settled.   Read More

"Affiliate" means a person in a dependent or subordinate relationship with another, not just anyone with some sort of connection to the other; so a settlement agreement’s release did not extend to the lessor of released defendants and plaintiff’s suit against that entity could proceed.  Read More

A 998 offer is invalid and will not shift costs if it requires a release of claims beyond those pertaining to the action in which the 998 offer is made, such as, here, where the 998 offer required plaintiff to release all claims he might have against the defendant, whether or not they were connected with the incident giving rise… Read More

A 998 offer requiring the opposing party to enter into a settlement agreement is not a valid 998 offer; while cases have allowed a 998 offer to demand a release, a settlement agreement is different, more extensive and more subject to disagreement as to form and contents.  Read More

A badly drafted settlement agreement did not condition plaintiff’s right to receive the settlement funds on plaintiff’s prior discharge of medical liens on his claim.  Read More

Plaintiff is the prevailing party entitled to an award of court costs under CCP 1032 on entry of a judgment of dismissal pursuant to a settlement under which plaintiff received monetary compensation for his or her claims. Read More