Opinion ID: 1182778
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Motion for Attorney Fees and Costs

Text: On September 14, 1951, Betty applied to the District Court of Appeal for attorney fees and costs incurred in the prohibition proceeding. The application will be considered as addressed to this court after the hearing was granted following the District Court decision. Betty alleges that she does not have the financial resources to prosecute the prohibition proceeding, that Clarence has a financial worth of $1,000,000, and that he has a yearly income of $100,000. The petition for a writ of prohibition was filed July 31, 1951, and the alternative writ issued on August 10, 1951. Insofar as the present application is for counsel fees for services performed before September 14th, the date of the application, the motion must be denied. ( Warner v. Warner, 34 Cal.2d 838, 840 [215 P.2d 20].) The application for services after that date, however, may be granted if the statute governing allowance of attorney fees applies to original proceedings in prohibition. [13] Civil Code, section 137.3, enacted in 1951, provides that, during the pendency of any action for divorce ... the court may order the husband ... to pay such amount as may be reasonably necessary for the cost of maintaining or defending the action and for attorney's fees. Section 137.3 is a recodification of the first sentence of former Civil Code, section 137. It was settled under section 137 that the phrase therein, when an action for divorce is pending, embraced many diverse proceedings growing out of the divorce action and arising after entry of the final decree. ( Wilson v. Wilson, 33 Cal.2d 107, 115 [199 P.2d 671] (proceeding to enforce distribution of community property); Reynolds v. Reynolds, 21 Cal.2d 580, 585 [134 P.2d 251] (modification of allowance for child support); Lamborn v. Lamborn, 190 Cal. 794, 796 [214 P. 862] (motion to modify alimony); Grannis v. Superior Court, 143 Cal. 630, 633 [77 P. 647] (motion to set aside final decree under Code Civ. Proc., § 473); Kohn v. Kohn, 95 Cal. App.2d 722, 724 [214 P.2d 80] (construction of property settlement); Parker v. Parker, 22 Cal. App.2d 139, 142 [70 P.2d 1003] (mandamus to enter judgment for delinquent alimony); Moore v. Gosbey, 130 Cal. App. 70, 73 [19 P.2d 995] (motion to modify alimony, made 10 years after final decree]; see cases collected in 15 A.L.R.2d 1270.) On principle, there is no difference between actions in which a woman is compelled by her former husband to resist by an appeal a proceeding brought by him to modify a custody or alimony award and actions in which she is compelled to seek prohibition to prevent improper modification of such awards. In either case she may be unable to retain counsel to represent her, and the policy underlying section 137.3 and the cases above cited are controlling. [14] In maintaining that section 137.3 does not apply to prohibition proceedings, Clarence first contends that Betty can recover suit money only when he is the other party to the litigation, and that here the respondent is the superior court. The statute does not support this contention. Section 137.3 is not framed to limit its application to actions in which the other spouse is a plaintiff or defendant. Instead, it applies during the pendency of any action for divorce and payments are to be made by the husband. Moreover, the adverse party in the present proceeding is clearly Clarence, the real party in interest, and not the superior court, the nominal respondent. The same attorneys represent Clarence and the respondent. The prohibition action is directed against Clarence, since Betty's success would preclude the trial court from making the custody order that he requests. [15] In the early development of the writ of prohibition, it is true, the writ was used by the king's courts to increase their authority at the expense of the ecclesiastical courts (1 Holdsworth, History of English Law, 3d ed., pp. 229, 594) and the lower court was thus a party to the litigation in a substantial sense. In California practice, however, an application to an appellate court for the writ is simply one of several means by which a litigant may obtain a review of action or threatened action by a trial court. (See 36 Cal.L.Rev. 75, 101-105; 23 So.Cal. L.Rev. 530, 533-537.) [16] The objective is the same as in an appeal, to prevent the trial court from taking action favorable to the other party. Thus the Rules on Appeal recognize the adversary character of prohibition proceedings by providing that the petition for the writ must disclose the name of the real party in interest (Rule 56(a)), that points and authorities must be served upon him (Rule 56(b)), and that he may demur or answer to the petition (Rule 56(c)). [17] Further, it is established that counsel fees may be recovered in mandamus proceedings in which the superior court is the nominal respondent. ( Parker v. Parker, 22 Cal. App.2d 139, 142 [70 P.2d 1003].) Clarence relies on McCarthy v. Superior Court, 65 Cal. App.2d 42, 43 [149 P.2d 871], holding that a successful applicant for a writ of prohibition cannot recover costs against the state under Code of Civil Procedure, section 1095. The McCarthy case would be in point only if Betty attempted to recover counsel fees from the state or the Superior Court. Clarence also invokes Havemeyer v. Superior Court, 84 Cal. 327, 372 [24 P. 121, 18 Am.St.Rep. 192, 10 L.R.A. 627], which held that the real party in interest should receive notice of the prohibition matter by being served with copies of the petition and being given a reasonable time to appear. The record shows that Clarence received ample notice and filed an answer to the petition. Nothing in the Havemeyer case supports Clarence's assertion that any order requiring him to pay counsel fees would be without due process. No reason thus appears why the fact that the superior court is the nominal respondent in this proceeding bars an award of attorney fees against the real party in interest under section 137.3. [18] Clarence contends finally that the Supreme Court is not the proper forum for this proceeding. This contention must be sustained. Assuming that we have jurisdiction to entertain an application for counsel fees, as a power necessarily incident to our original jurisdiction to issue the writ of prohibition, we should not pass upon an application involving questions of fact on the basis of the printed record and affidavits when a more satisfactory alternative exists. In Parker v. Parker, 22 Cal. App.2d 139 [70 P.2d 1003], the trial court awarded the wife counsel fees during the pendency of mandamus proceedings within the original jurisdiction of the District Court of Appeal. This procedure has many advantages. The trial court, with the parties before it for examination, is better qualified than the appellate court to pass on the amount of suit money, if any, that should be awarded. (See Bobbitt v. Bobbitt, 297 Ky. 28, 29 [178 S.W.2d 986]; Craig v. Craig, 115 Va. 764, 765 [80 S.E. 507].) The trial court is not deprived of jurisdiction to award counsel fees because the action is an original proceeding before the appellate court. The decision whether the peremptory writ should issue is only a part of the whole litigation between Clarence and Betty on the custody matter. In an analogous situation of an appeal from a custody or alimony order, the lower court retains power to order payment of counsel fees to enable the wife to prosecute her appeal, and such order is not considered in excess of the trial court's jurisdiction as a further proceeding in the court below upon the judgment or order appealed from. (Code Civ. Proc., § 946; Reilly v. Reilly, 60 Cal. 624, 626; DeLeshe v. DeLeshe, 80 Cal. App.2d 517, 518 [181 P.2d 931].) Like a stay on appeal, the alternative writ protects the moving party and the appellate court by maintaining the status quo pending decision by the appellate court. It does not deprive the trial court of jurisdiction to determine that both litigants are fairly represented. Under the circumstances of this case, Betty should not be penalized because her application was erroneously made to the appellate court. Accordingly, the denial of her motion for attorney fees will be without prejudice to application to the trial court for attorney fees and costs incurred since the date of the motion, September 14, 1951. The motion for attorney fees and costs is denied without prejudice. Let the peremptory writ of prohibition issue as prayed.