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Court of Appeal:
Labor Code’s Attorney-Fee Provision Trumps CCP Section
By a MetNews Staff Writer
A Code of Civil Procedure section that vests discretion in a trial judge to deny costs, including otherwise awardable attorney fees, to a prevailing plaintiff in an unlimited jurisdiction case where the recovery is less than the $25,000 jurisdictional minimum in such a case cannot be applied in a wage-and-hour suit, the Court of Appeal for this district has held, declaring that a conflicting Labor Code provision takes precedence.
It announced that “employees who prevail in actions to recover unpaid minimum and overtime wages are entitled to their reasonable litigation costs under Labor Code section 1194, subdivision (a), irrespective of the amount recovered.”
Justice Victor Viramontes of Div. Eight authored the opinion, filed Monday. It reverses orders by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Jon R. Takasugi denying an award of attorney fees and ordinary costs to plaintiff Elinton Gramajo who, on Oct. 20, 2021, obtained a jury verdict for $5,442.17 which, with interest and statutory penalties added, came up $7,659.93.
His action was against his former employer, Joe’s Pizza on Sunset, Inc., as well as a related entity, and the owner of the local six-restaurant chain, Giuseppe Vitale. The former delivery-driver sought attorney fees in the amount of $296,920 and costs of $26,932.84.
Takasugi relied on Code of Civil Procedure §1033(a), which provides:
“Costs or any portion of claimed costs shall be as determined by the court in its discretion in a case other than a limited civil case in accordance with Section 1034 where the prevailing party recovers a judgment that could have been rendered in a limited civil case.”
Takasugi’s View
In his order of May 10, 2022, Takasugi said, faulting the performance by the plaintiff’s lawyer, Alfredo Nava Jr. of Montebello:
“…Plaintiff’s case clearly should have been brought in limited jurisdiction, was extremely straightforward, and demanded very little skill. Despite this, Plaintiffs counsel repeatedly engaged in conduct which evinced a prioritization of gamesmanship over professionalism and which bore no proportional relationship to the work actually required to litigate the underlying claims.”
He continued:
“Here, Plaintiff’s request for attorney fees is so grossly inflated as to constitute a special circumstance warranting the denial of fees altogether. The public policy ideals supporting the Labor Code’s award of attorney fees to a prevailing party are not served where a litigant engages in egregious conduct only to be rewarded by a windfall of attorney fees.
“In light of the fact that this case should never have been filed in this jurisdiction, the gross disproportionality in the hours billed-for and the success obtained, and Plaintiff’s counsel bad faith tactics, the Court finds the fee request to be so unreasonably inflated as to justify zero attorney fees recovered.”
Viramontes’s Opinion
Disagreeing with Takasugi’s conclusion that, under the circumstances, the provision of the Labor Code calling for an award of costs, including attorney fees, to a victorious litigant in a wage-and-hour case must be subordinated to §1033(a), Viramontes declared that Labor Code §1194(a) wins out. That section says:
“[A]ny employee receiving less than the legal minimum wage or the legal overtime compensation applicable to the employee is entitled to recover in a civil action the unpaid balance of the full amount of this minimum wage or overtime compensation, including interest thereon, reasonable attorney’s fees, and costs of suit.”
He wrote:
“Generally, when two statutes conflict, a specific statute will take precedence over a general one, and a more recently enacted statute will take precedence over an earlier one.”
Viramontes observed that §1194(a) “is the more recently enacted statute”—the relevant portion having been ordained in 1991 while §1034 harks to 1953—and that §1194(a) “is the more specific statute.”
The justice commented:
“As a note of caution, our holding should not be read as a license for attorneys litigating minimum and overtime wage cases to over-file their cases or request unreasonable and excessive cost awards free of consequence. Under Labor Code section 1194, subdivision (a), a prevailing employee is still only entitled to a reasonable fee and cost award….In assessing requests for litigation costs, trial courts must always be guided by what is reasonable and exercise their discretion to strike costs or reduce fees they find unreasonable.”
Remand Ordered
While the opinion orders a remand for a setting of costs, including attorney fees Viramontes specified that “Gramajo is only entitled to his reasonable fees and costs, nothing more.”
The case is Gramajo v. Joe’s Pizza on Sunset, Inc., 2024 S.O.S. 1110.
On appeal, Nava represented Gramajo. West Los Angeles practitioner Douglas A. Linde acted for the employer.
Nava commented yesterday:
“Our office and Mr. Gramajo are grateful to the Court of Appeals for clarifying the remedial purpose and nature of Labor Code Section 1194, as well as the limited effect of Code of Civil Procedure Section 1033 when conflicting with mandatory, statutory fee and costs’ provisions. The six-year journey to the recovery of Mr. Gramajo’s wages is one step closer to the end. For that, Mr. Gramajo is grateful to the Court of Appeals for this well-reasoned opinion.”
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