Opinion
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS
APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County. Super. Ct. No. PC037666 Holly Kendig, Judge.
Roy Legal Group and Frank P. Agello for Plaintiff and Appellant.
No appearance for Defendant and Respondent.
ARMSTRONG, J.
Plaintiff, attorney Raj Roy, appeals the judgment entered in his suit in quantum meruit for the reasonable value of his services in prosecuting defendant Lolita Resari's medical malpractice, prior to the termination of their contingency fee agreement. Finding no error, we affirm.
Defendant retained plaintiff on a contingency fee basis to prosecute her medical malpractice lawsuit against the emergency room physician, Dr. Leung, who treated her during a heart attack. After a mediation session held shortly before the trial date, Dr. Leung offered to settle the malpractice suit for $60,000. Plaintiff advised defendant to accept the offer. Defendant declined the offer, fired defendant as her attorney, and hired another attorney, Thomas Rotert, to represent her. After the trial court made certain pre-trial rulings unfavorable to defendant, she settled with Dr. Leung for $58,000.
Plaintiff filed this suit in quantum meruit to recover the reasonable value of his fees, pursuant to Fracasse v. Brent (1972) 6 Cal.3d 784. According to plaintiff, he requested $22,666 in fees based on the $58,000 settlement and pursuant to the MICRA limitation on attorney fees in medical malpractice cases found in Business & Professions Code section 6146. Plaintiff also sought $4,264 in attorney costs.
Following a bench trial, judgment was entered for plaintiff in the amount of $6,000, representing 30 hours of legal services at the rate of $200 per hour.
Plaintiff maintains that the trial court abused its discretion, resulting in a miscarriage of justice. We find substantial evidence to support the judgment, and so affirm. (See, e.g., Watson v. Wood Dimension, Inc. (1989) 209 Cal.App.3d 1359, 1365-1366 [substantial evidence standard of review for quantum meruit].)
We begin by noting that the client's power to discharge an attorney is absolute. (Code Civ. Proc., § 284; Fracasse v. Brent, supra, 6 Cal.3d at p. 790.) In discussing the unique relationship between attorney and client, the court stated that "'The interest of the client in the successful prosecution or defense of the action is superior to that of the attorney, and he has the right to employ such attorney as will in his opinion best subserve his interest. The relation between them is such that the client is justified in seeking to dissolve that relation whenever he ceases to have absolute confidence in either the integrity or the judgment or the capacity of the attorney.'" (Ibid.) Accordingly, an attorney, like plaintiff, discharged prior to the occurrence of the contingency referenced in his contingency fee agreement with defendant, may recover only the reasonable value of his services rendered to the time of discharge. (Id. at p. 793.)
Plaintiff testified at trial regarding the legal services he rendered on defendant's behalf. He concluded that he was entitled to attorney fees of $22,666, the amount he would have received had plaintiff accepted Dr. Leung's settlement offer of $60,000. Plaintiff also requested costs of $4,264.
After presentation of evidence at the trial, the trial court determined that plaintiff had established his entitlement to be compensated for 30 hours of legal services, at the rate of $200 per hour. In addition to $6,000 in fees, the court awarded plaintiff $2,591 in costs.
In its tentative decision, the trial court explained the reasons underlying its determination of the value of plaintiff's services: "On the quantum meruit/unjust enrichment claim, plaintiff Roy came to court seeking the same fees he would have been entitled to under a contingency fee agreement tempered by MICRA guidelines pursuant to California Business and Professions Code section 6146a in the amount of $22,666.66 plus interest. However, his proof of the actual services allegedly rendered and their value was lacking and insubstantial, and in many instances comprised of obvious speculation. His testimony on the work done and the value thereof was not particularly credible, because it was so lacking in specificity, and seemed to be based in good part on guessing. Included in what he seeks from defendant Resari are the value of his legal services in pursuing his own lien and his own claim for attorneys fees which should not be
Mrs. Resari's responsibility, as they were not incurred to protect Mrs. Resari's interests. That overreaching also undermines the credibility of attorney Roy. Nor was it appropriate for attorney Roy to seek reimbursement from Mrs. Resari for the cost of three attorneys to try to convince her to accept the settlement offered in mediation. Nor is attorney Roy's claim of 22 hours to draft a four-page complaint reasonable. These serve as examples of some of the problems."
Moreover, the trial court continued, "Defendant Resari established quite convincingly that attorney Roy had neglected and mishandled her case." Among other cited deficiencies, plaintiff "failed to timely designate expert witnesses on the medical malpractice case, never sought relief from the court for the failure, and faced a motion in limine to exclude any experts at trial. Attorney Roy then failed to respond to new counsel Rotert's request for a declaration to support asking the trial court to grant leave to file a tardy expert designation. Without an expert, a medical malpractice claim is doomed. . . . When trying to explain these substantial problems with his legal representation, attorney Roy argued that the apparent problems were not real for a variety of unconvincing reasons, including purported oral agreements with opposing counsel."
The trial court further determined that plaintiff had unclean hands, and that his actions "harmed and devalued" Resari's case. "It is difficult to tell what the value of the underlying case would have been had it been handled properly." The court nevertheless determined that Resari "received value for 30 hours of attorney time." Consequently, the court awarded $6,000 in attorney fees and $2,591 in allowable costs.
Plaintiff acknowledges that he is limited to a cause of action in quantum meruit as a result of defendant's termination of the contingency fee agreement. He argues, however, that the trial court erred in its valuation of his services: "Having established that he was entitled to fees as a discharged attorney where the contingency has occurred, the issue before the court in the quantum meruit case was what constitutes reasonable value of attorney Roy's services. It is [plaintiff's] opinion that the confusion of the court in how to value the services stemmed from the court's interpretation of the term 'reasonable value.' The court believed that it had the discretion to subjectively value each service performed by attorney Roy or his office in obtaining the settlement; the court further believed that it could give an opinion as to the value of the settlement based on attorney Roy's activities."
In fact, the trial court does have discretion to subjectively value the services rendered and to compare that value with the result obtained. (See, e.g., People ex rel. Dept. of Transportation v. Yuki (1995) 31 Cal.App.4th 1754, 1767-1768.) Indeed, contrary to plaintiff's position, the contingency fee which would have been earned had defendant not discharged plaintiff is of no moment. The sole issue for the court was to determine what fee would reasonably compensate plaintiff for the services he rendered which redounded to the benefit of defendant. Consequently, the trial court was perfectly justified in looking past plaintiff's recitation of the hours he expended in preparing defendant's case for trial to the reasonable value of the lawyer's efforts at the point in time when plaintiff was substituted out and Mr. Rotert was substituted in.
Plaintiff's arguments concerning whether the overall contingency fee charges is conscionable and the amount, in percentages, that each attorney contributed to the result obtained are wide of the mark. The single issue for the trial court was the reasonable value, to the defendant, of plaintiff's services.
Plaintiff complains that the trial court criticized his prosecution of the defendant's case and concludes that such criticism amounts to a charge of negligence and is improper in a quantum meruit case for attorney fees where the attorney has obtained a settlement for a client. Contrary to plaintiff's implication, the trial court did not reduce the fee in order to compensate defendant for plaintiff's negligence. Rather, the court took into account plaintiff's errors which reduced the value of his services. For instance, the court was certainly justified in concluding that defendant ought not be required to pay expert witness fees to a witness whose testimony the trial court in the underlying action had excluded due to plaintiff's failure to timely designate. There was no abuse of discretion.
DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed.
We concur: TURNER, P. J., MOSK, J.