The California Appellate Court in the Second District issued a ruling in the case of Serrano v. Stefan Merli Plastering Co. in which the plaintiffs in the case were objecting to the expedite fees charged them by the deposition firm that reported the matter, Coast Court Reporters of Irvine, California.

Coast Court Reporters had prepared a transcript on an expedited basis at the request of counsel for the defense, Stefan Merli Plastering Co. The depo firm then contacted the plaintiffs in the case, Porfirio Serrano, et al, asking if they would like a copy of the transcript. And that’s when the trouble began when the plaintiffs claimed in addition to being charged for a certified copy of the depo transcript they were also charged $261.56 for ““EXPEDITE CHARGE –4 Day.” Counsel fo the Serranos argued that they shouldn’t have had to bear any fees for expedited service as it was the defendants who requested the transcript to be prepared on an expedited basis and they wanted a copy of the depo transcript that had already been prepared.

The Serranos then filed an ex parte application with the trial court ordering that Coast Court Reporters provide a copy of the depo transcript without the fee for expedited service. Coast Court Reporters retained counsel of their own to oppose the order and a hearing was then set in the trial court to determine the outcome of whether the Serranos should have to pay for the expedicted fee. At the hearing the trial court was sympathetic with the Serranos but ruled that its hands were tied and that it could not set limits on the fees charged by deposition reporters including expedited service. So sympathetic was the ruling court towards the Serranos that it practically invited counsel for the Serranos to appeal his ruling as reflected in comments taken from the hearing.

“I would love to give you relief. I don’t think I can. So take it up. Maybe, you know, one of the divisions up there will feel sympathetic.”

And in a ruling issued by Justice Croskey and concurred by Justices Klein and Aldrich, the appellate court ruled that the trial court indeed “had the authority to determine whether the amounts that the Serranos were required to pay for copies of the deposition transcripts were reasonable…the court’s failure to exercise its discretion in this regard was error.

In its decision, the appellate court ruled out the reasons why it believed the trial court had the authority to determine what constituted “reasonable fees.”

For a deposition reporter to refuse to provide a copy of a transcript to a non-noticing party in a pending action unless the party agrees to pay an unreasonable fee would be grossly unfair. Moreover, for a deposition reporter, as an officer of the court, to engage in such conduct would be an abuse of the reporter’s authority. For a trial court to condone such conduct by condtitioning the party’s right to receive a copy of a transcript on payment of an unreasonable fee would undermine rather than promote the administration of justice and could very well result in a denial of due process to the non-noticing party victimized by the reporter’s conduct. It therefore follws that the only monetary condition that the court may properly place upon the non-noticing party’s right to receive a copy of the deposition transcript would be payment of a reasonable fee.

The appellate court then reversed the lower’s court order that the Serrano’s pay for the expedited fee and remanded the case back to the trial court for a hearing to determined the reasonableness of the expedited fee charged by Coast Court Reporters.

You can read the appellate court’s entire ruling here.

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 15th, 2008 at 12:10 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.