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Vo v. Las Virgenes Municipal Water District3/28/2000
CERTIFIED FOR PUBLICATION
APPEAL from an order of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County. Harvey A. Schneider, Judge. Affirmed.
I. Introduction
Defendant, Las Virgenes Municipal Water District, appeals from an order awarding, plaintiff, Jonathan Vo, $470,000 in attorney fees after he prevailed on his complaint for violations of the Fair Employment and Housing Act ("FEHA") (Gov. Code, ยง 12900 et seq.). We agree with plaintiff that defendant has failed to provide an adequate record to permit us to determine if the trial court abused its discretion in fixing the attorney fee award in the sum of $470,000. We affirm and plaintiff may seek additional fees pursuant to rule 870.2 of the California Rules of Court.
II. Background
The parties elected to proceed under California Rules of Court, rule 5.1 and have filed a joint appendix. The joint appendix does not contain a copy of the complaint or answer. The record also does not include a copy of the reporter's transcript from a three-week jury trial. Both parties have referred to the complaint and matters raised during the trial which has not been made a part of this record on appeal. From the sparse record that has been provided, the following procedural and factual matters are set forth.
Plaintiff's employment by defendant led to a jury verdict in his favor on causes of action for hostile work environment and failure to prevent harassment or discrimination in violation of the FEHA. The jury awarded plaintiff $40,000 in compensatory damages, which award was reduced by stipulation to $37,500. Plaintiff did not prove causes of action for retaliation and discriminatory denial of promotion.
Plaintiff's counsel, Lee R. Feldman, represented six former and current employees of defendant in FEHA claims. Plaintiff and Leon Holiday filed this current lawsuit for discrimination and harassment. Mr. Holiday's portion of the lawsuit was settled for $380,000. On September 23, 1998, plaintiff filed a motion requesting attorney fees in the amount of $616,917.85 pursuant to section 12965 on the ground he prevailed in the action brought under the FEHA against defendant. Mr. Feldman filed a declaration in which he stated that he made a settlement offer to defendant in December 1995. The settlement offer made on plaintiff's behalf was for $75,000. This was after incurring significant attorney fees drafting a proposed lawsuit, meeting with plaintiff, and corresponding with defendant's counsel. On December 31, 1995, defendant communicated to plaintiffs that it would pay Mr. Holiday's demand of $180,000 but would not offer Mr. Vo anything. On January 19, 1996, a few weeks after the lawsuit was filed, plaintiff's counsel caused a Code of Civil Procedure section 998 offer of settlement to be served on defendant for a total payment of $335,000. The offer was made on behalf of both Mr. Holiday and Mr. Vo. Defendant allowed this offer to expire. However, less than six months later, defendant offered to settle Mr. Holiday's case alone for $380,000. The $380,000 offer was accepted by Mr. Holiday. Defendant made no settlement offers to Mr. Vo at all. Defendant refused to accept any of plaintiff's offers thereafter. Mr. Feldman declared that his focus in discovery and trial preparation was devoted to proving that upper-level management was staffed by racially prejudiced person whose biases infected the work environment. Mr. Feldman estimated that 90 percent of time and energy was devoted to proving the existence of racial bias on the part of defendant's managers. Mr. Feldman estimated that only a small portion of time (less than 5 percent) was used to prove the promotional process was infected by the upper-leve
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