Filed 1/18/18 Landmoore v. Foxcroft CA6
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS

California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.


IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

SIXTH APPELLATE DISTRICT


DAYLE J. LANDMOORE,

Plaintiff and Appellant,

v.

CLARRE FOXCROFT et al.,

Defendants and Respondents.
H042203
(Santa Clara County
Super. Ct. No. 1-13-CV-239616)

In this action for personal injuries, a jury awarded plaintiff Dayle Landmoore damages attributable to an automobile accident caused by defendant Clarre Foxcroft. Plaintiff sought pretrial costs and prejudgment interest. The trial court granted defendant’s motion to tax costs in part, and it denied plaintiff’s request for prejudgment interest. Plaintiff appeals, contending that the court should have included all of her claimed costs, including expert witness fees, because the judgment she obtained exceeded both her pretrial offer and the amount awarded her in judicial arbitration. She further asserts error in the court’s denial of prejudgment interest. We find the rulings to be proper under Code of Civil Procedure section 1141.21 and Civil Code section 3291. Accordingly, we will affirm the judgment.
Background
Plaintiff initiated this action on January 16, 2013 with her complaint alleging negligence and negligence per se, after defendant failed to stop her car and collided with plaintiff’s car, which in turn struck the car in front of plaintiff. The parties went to judicial arbitration, and on December 27, 2013, the arbitrator awarded plaintiff $30,000 plus “[s]tatutory costs.” Plaintiff rejected this nonbinding award and requested a trial de novo. In June of 2014 plaintiff offered to settle the case for $44,999, pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 998. Defendant did not respond, however, and the matter proceeded to trial.
On November 19, 2014, the jury reached its verdict in plaintiff’s favor, awarding her $19,935 for her past medical expenses and $10,000 for her past noneconomic loss. A “Judgment On Jury Verdict” was entered on December 2, 2014.
Plaintiff submitted a memorandum of costs on December 8, 2014, claiming $38,424.92, including $27,667.50 in witness fees. On December 17, 2014, she moved for a new trial, for prejudgment interest, and for attorney fees. Defendant opposed all three motions and submitted her own motion to tax costs. The trial court denied both the motion for a new trial and the motion for attorney fees. Neither of these rulings is challenged on appeal.
On March 4, 2015, the court granted defendant’s motion to tax costs and struck $27,872.25 from plaintiff’s cost bill, leaving plaintiff $10,552.67 in costs. On the same day the court denied plaintiff’s request for prejudgment interest. By amended judgment on March 24, 2015, plaintiff obtained a total recovery of $40,487.67, composed of the cost allowance plus the jury award of $29,935.00. Plaintiff filed a timely notice of appeal on April 1, 2015.
On May 1, 2015, counsel for defendant’s insurer paid the full amount of the judgment, and on June 25 the court filed an “Acknowledgment of Satisfaction of Judgment” showing payment in full.
Discussion
1. Costs after an Arbitration Award
Plaintiff first challenges the trial court’s limitation on the costs it awarded her. As noted, of her $38,424.92 claim she received only $10,552.67, the court having struck $27,667.50 in fees for medical witnesses along with minor other fees. In moving to tax costs defendant argued that plaintiff was not entitled to any costs, because she failed to achieve a better result than she obtained after arbitration. Defendant cited Code of Civil Procedure section 1141.21, which addresses the consequences of a party’s rejection of an award after judicial arbitration and proceeds to trial. Plaintiff maintained that the final judgment exceeded the arbitration award and therefore she was entitled to all of her costs.
Section 1141.21, subdivision (a)(1), states, in part: “If the judgment upon the trial de novo is not more favorable in either the amount of damages awarded or the type of relief granted for the party electing the trial de novo than the arbitration award, the court shall order that party to pay the following nonrefundable costs and fees, unless the court finds in writing and upon motion that the imposition of these costs and fees would create such a substantial economic hardship as not to be in the interest of justice: (A) To the court, the compensation actually paid to the arbitrator, less any amount paid pursuant to subparagraph (D). [¶] (B) To the other party or parties, all costs specified in Section 1033.5, and the party electing the trial de novo shall not recover his or her costs. [¶] (C) To the other party or parties, the reasonable costs of the services of expert witnesses, who are not regular employees of any party, actually incurred or reasonably necessary in the preparation or trial of the case. [¶] (D) To the other party or parties, the compensation paid by the other party or parties to the arbitrator, pursuant to subdivision (b) of Section 1141.28.” (Italics added.)
The costs provision in section 1141.21 reflects the Legislature’s objective to encourage the finality of judicial arbitration awards and discourage trial de novo following such procedures. “Discouraging trial de novo is essential to the proper functioning of the judicial arbitration system. Along with its goal of resolving small claims efficiently and affordably, judicial arbitration is intended to ease court case loads. [Citation.] The success of judicial arbitration in achieving these goals is dependent on a small incidence of trial de novo election.” (Flynn v. Gorton (1989) 207 Cal.App.3d 1550, 1555; accord, Crampton v. Takegoshi (1993) 17 Cal.App.4th 308, 319, disapproved on another point in Phelps v. Stostad (1997) 16 Cal.4th 23, 34; see also Smith v. Rae-Venter Law Group (2002) 29 Cal.4th 345, 363 [sections 1141.21 and 998 are both intended to discourage unnecessary trials].)
On appeal, the parties continue to debate the meaning of “judgment” in the predicate scenario that the party requesting a trial de novo fails to achieve a more favorable judgment. Plaintiff insists that when the costs awarded her by the court are added to the damages found by the jury, the final judgment of $40,487.67 was more favorable than the $30,000 arbitration award. Plaintiff’s position cannot withstand analysis.
Both parties acknowledge that this court’s role on appeal is to determine as a matter of law the meaning of the language section 1141.21. Our obligation is thus to “ ‘examine the statutory language, giving it a plain and commonsense meaning. We do not examine that language in isolation, but in the context of the statutory framework as a whole in order to determine its scope and purpose and to harmonize the various parts of the enactment. If the language is clear, courts must generally follow its plain meaning unless a literal interpretation would result in absurd consequences the Legislature did not intend.’ ” (Hutcheson v. Eskaton Fountainwood Lodge (2017) 12 Cal.App.5th 899 [219 Cal.Rptr. 211, 218-219] judg. vacated, quoting Coalition of Concerned Communities, Inc. v. City of Los Angeles (2004) 34 Cal.4th 733, 737; see also Schatz v. Allen Matkins Leck Gamble & Mallory LLP (2009) 45 Cal.4th 557, 571 [most reliable indicator of Legislature’s intent is the statutory language itself; hence, “[i]f the words themselves are not ambiguous, we presume the Legislature meant what it said, and the statute's plain meaning governs.”].)
Here, plaintiff contends that the meaning of “judgment” is undisputed, resorting to the “one final judgment” rule. In her view, because there is only one final determination of the rights of the parties, the figure expressed in that disposition—the one that “determines the last or ultimate rights of the parties” is what the Legislature meant in predicating post-arbitration costs on a “more favorable judgment.” In making this argument plaintiff has ignored the context of the disputed language and thus has dispensed entirely with a cardinal principle of statutory construction; indeed, she reads the critical term out of the statute. To avoid losing the right to costs and incurring liability for the other party’s costs, the party electing trial de novo must achieve a judgment “more favorable in either the amount of damages awarded or the type of relief granted.” (§ 1141.21, subd. (a)(1), italics added.)
Here, the jury’s verdict awarding $29,935 in damages was deemed the “Judgment of the Court” on December 2, 2014. That was the judgment to which the statute applies. A contrary determination would make no sense, as it would require the judgment to include the costs the party is seeking in order to determine the party’s entitlement to those very costs. It would also be inconsistent with the statutory language: If costs were first included before comparing the judgment with the arbitration award, there would be no purpose for then denying those same costs in subdivision (a)(1)(B) of section 1141.21 (“the party electing the trial de novo shall not recover his or her costs.”). And of course, if costs were first to be added to the damages awarded by the jury to arrive at the applicable “judgment,” there would be no point in qualifying “judgment” as “the amount of damages awarded or the type of relief granted.” Plaintiff cannot avoid the legislative penalty for rejecting an arbitration award simply by ignoring the statutory language compelling denial of her costs. We have no doubt that the damages awarded by the jury—here, $29,935—must be measured against the $30,000 awarded by the arbitrator in order to meet the conditions set forth in section 1141.21. Plaintiff clearly did not meet the threshold for recovery of her litigation costs.
Plaintiff cannot escape this conclusion by offering a misleading representation of the final judgment as being “about money or damages ($40,487.67).” That $40,487.67 is composed of damages plus the costs granted by the court. Likewise, plaintiff’s assertion that defendant agreed that the “final damage [was] $40,487.67 and she paid it” does not deceive this court into accepting that figure as constituting only damages, nor does it properly suggest that defendant’s payment of the judgment is a concession that plaintiff is entitled to even more costs than was awarded her in the judgment. Indeed, if satisfaction of the judgment operates as such a concession to plaintiff’s theory, then acceptance of that payment should likewise operate as plaintiff’s concession that the final judgment encompasses the entire amount to which she was entitled.
The outcome of the dispute in Crampton v. Takegoshi, supra, 17 Cal.App.4th 308, 319 supports this interpretation of the statutory language. There the arbitrator awarded the plaintiff $44,497.72; the plaintiff rejected the award, and the jury awarded $58,862. Both parties sought their costs, and the defendant opposed the plaintiff’s claim, citing section 1141.21, subdivision (a). Plaintiff was held to be entitled to his costs. (Crampton v. Takegoshi, supra, at pp. 314-314.) Although the plaintiff’s employer had claimed some of the arbitration damages as reimbursement for its contribution to the plaintiff’s medical and disability payments, the reviewing court determined that “what is to be measured for purpose of the statute is the total award obtained in the arbitration proceeding as against the total judgment in the third[-]party proceeding, not the amount that plaintiff actually received after deduction of the employer's lien in those proceedings. At trial, the jury returned a verdict in favor of plaintiff for $58,862. Consequently, as against defendant as the third[ ]party tortfeasor, plaintiff recovered a more favorable judgment in the amount of damages awarded in the de novo trial than he did in the arbitration proceeding.” (Id. at p. 320.) Notably, the court did not add costs to the trial damages in making the comparison between the damages award of the arbitrator and that of the “judgment.”
Plaintiff’s reliance on Bhullar v. Tayyab (1996) 46 Cal.App.4th 582 (Bhullar) is unavailing. In that case neither the buyer nor the seller of a liquor store was awarded damages in judicial arbitration. The seller requested a trial de novo and rejected the buyer’s section 998 settlement offer. The jury, however, awarded damages to the buyer. On appeal by both parties, the appellate court agreed with the buyer that he was entitled to attorney fees as part of his costs, notwithstanding the seller’s suggestion that such an award was discretionary under section 1033.5 and former section 1021.1, subdivision (b). The costs award under section 1141.21, held the court, is mandatory absent “manifest economic hardship,” a circumstance not present in the case. (Bhullar, supra, at p. 590)
The disposition in Bhullar offers no support for the position taken by plaintiff here. There was no question in that case that the jury’s verdict was more favorable than the arbitrator’s award, which was zero; thus, there was no opportunity for the appellate court to determine the appropriate measure by which the results from the arbitration and the trial are compared. The jury’s verdict here, by contrast, was $29,935, the amount reflected in the “Judgment on Jury Verdict.” Unquestionably this amount is less than the arbitrator’s award.
We therefore reject plaintiff’s attempt to load her costs onto the jury’s damages award in order to arrive at a judgment exceeding the arbitrator’s award. No authority supports such a manipulation of the statutory text. Because we conclude that plaintiff is foreclosed from recovering any of her costs under section 1141.21, we need not address her more specific assertion that she was entitled to her expert witness fees.
2. Prejudgment Interest
Plaintiff further argues that the trial court erred by denying her request for $1,279.20 as prejudgment interest. She maintains that she was entitled to interest from June 13, 2014, the date she made her section 998 settlement offer, through November 19, 2014, when the jury reached its verdict. The premise of plaintiff’s position is that she “obtained [a] more favorable judgment” than her settlement offer as well as the arbitration award. She is mistaken.
Civil Code section 3291(hereafter “section 3291”), which is specifically applicable to personal injury actions, states: “If the plaintiff makes an offer pursuant to Section 998 of the Code of Civil Procedure which the defendant does not accept prior to trial or within 30 days, whichever occurs first, and the plaintiff obtains a more favorable judgment, the judgment shall bear interest at the legal rate of 10 percent per annum calculated from the date of the plaintiff's first offer pursuant to Section 998 of the Code of Civil Procedure which is exceeded by the judgment, and interest shall accrue until the satisfaction of judgment.” This provision “plainly reflects a legislative policy choice to encourage early settlement of personal injury actions and to deprive a trial court of discretion in the matter.” (Martinez v. Brownco Const. Co., Inc. (2013) 56 Cal.4th 1014, 1024, fn 8.)
Plaintiff’s settlement offer was $44,999.00. According to her calculation, “the total amount of the judgment for purposes of section 998 is $49,442.42.” This figure encompasses the jury’s verdict plus $19,507.42 in costs, not including expert witness fees. But plaintiff did not recover $19,507.42 in costs. The trial court, in its discretion, awarded her $10,552.67, for a total judgment of $40,487.67. Thus, plaintiff misstates the facts in asserting that she “received a more favorable judgment than the offer she made to [defendant].” Consequently, even if it were proper to include costs in determining entitlement to prejudgment interest (but see Lakin v. Watkins Associated Industries (1993) 6 Cal.4th 644, 658-659 [Legislature intended availability of prejudgment interest to be confined to personal injury damages, not entire judgment]; see also Bean v. Pacific Coast Elevator Corporation (2015) 234 Cal.App.4th 1423, 1430 [prejudgment interest may not be awarded on costs]), she would still not meet the prerequisite for such recovery under section 3291.
Disposition
The judgment of March 24, 2015 is affirmed.
 


_________________________________
ELIA, ACTING P. J.

WE CONCUR:



_______________________________
BAMATTRE-MANOUKIAN, J.



_______________________________
MIHARA, J.









Landmoore v. Foxcroft et al.
H042203