Court Opinion

ID: 9709664
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 03:52:49.719914+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:22:50.724494
License: Public Domain

PRESIDING JUSTICE GOLDENHERSH, concurring in part and dissenting in part: I concur with the majority denying plaintiff’s request to tax deposition costs and the costs of this appeal. On the recovery of costs issue, I respectfully dissent. In drafting section 5 — 108 of the Code, the General Assembly did not specify that recovery refers only to judgments by the trial court. And in common usage, the words “recover” and “recovery” are used to describe any benefits gained by a litigant, whether by judgment or settlement. Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 1898 (1986) defines “recover” as follows: “[T]o gain by legal process.” I interpret such a definition to encompass all proceeds received by a plaintiff as a result of pursuing a cause of action, including proceeds plaintiff may gain from a settlement agreement. I find further support for this position in section 14 of “An Act to revise the law in relation to attorneys and counselors” (the Act), which states in pertinent part: “Attorneys at law shall have a lien upon all claims, demands and causes of action, including all claims for unliquidated damages, which may be placed in'their hands by their clients for suit or collection, or upon which suit or action has been instituted *** for the services of such attorneys rendered or to be rendered for their clients on account of such suits, claims, demands or causes of action. *** Such lien shall attach to any verdict, judgment or order entered and to any money or properly which may be recovered, on account of such suits, claims, demands or causes of action ***.” (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1985, ch. 13, par. 14.) Our supreme court has held that money paid to a plaintiff in a personal injury action under a contract of settlement was “recovered” within the meaning of the Act. (Standidge v. Chicago Rys. Co. (1912), 254 Ill. 524, 98 N.E. 963.) In reaching that conclusion, the court determined that “[t]he language of the act under consideration clearly indicates that the word ‘recover’ is here used in the sense of receive.” (254 Ill. at 534, 98 N.E. at 966.) The language in section 5 — 108 of the Code of Civil Procedure similarly indicates that “recover” is used in the sense of receive. The word “judgment” is conspicuously absent from the language of section 5 — 108. If we exchange the word “recovers” for the phrase “receives compensation” or “retrieves damages,” the meaning of section 5 — 108 remains the same. In the present case, plaintiffs filed an action in this State for personal damages and received in excess of $45,000 from defendant by way of a settlement agreement. I would hold that plaintiffs thereby met the statutory requirements to recover costs of suit under section 5 — 108.