Lemons into Lemonade:  Defense 998 Offer Was Well-Taken and Plaintiffs Did Not Achieve Their Real Litigation Objectives in Rejecting Offer and Going to Trial.

     CCP § 998 offers are tricky things, but legislatively crafted so that the offeree give serious consideration to the offer so that a settlement can be reached--saving everyone (the litigants and courts) a lot of resources. Plaintiffs in the next case did win “lemon law” relief for an apparently defective Bentley, but did not win their real litigation objectives as we shall see soon. That meant the defense, even though having to pony up money, was able to garner certain costs of the litigation under § 998.

     Williams v. Bentley Motors, Inc., Case No. B217997 (2d Dist., Div. 8 Feb. 3, 2012) (unpublished) is a case where plaintiffs did obtain significant “lemon law” relief by equitable rulings from a trial court after a jury verdict and grant of a new trial motion. However, the problem was that the defendant had served a tightly-crafted § 998 offer that gave them all the reimbursements awarded by the court (which it seemingly had paid anyway along the way to plaintiffs). What plaintiffs really wanted was reimbursement of full-time chauffeur costs to drive them around when the Bentley was out of commission and recovery of lost profits from using the limo for personal rather than business purposes. Plaintiffs did not win any of this relief, such that the § 998 offer prevailed--with both the trial and appellate courts focusing on whether the pragmatic litigation objectives of plaintiffs were met (and they were not). Defendant was entitled to recover certain costs allowable under § 998, although not specified in the decision.

     Also, even though the defendant misidentified one particular offeree once in the § 998 offer, the offeree was identified correctly many other times; this one typo did not invalidate the offer.

Toomer’s Drug Store.  Auburn, Alabama.  2010.  Carol M. Highsmith collection, Library of Congress.