Safari Associates v. Super. Ct.
Annotate this CasePetitioner Safari Associates and real party in interest Alan Tarlov arbitrated a dispute pursuant to a written agreement. The arbitrator awarded Safari damages, attorney fees, and costs. Safari petitioned to confirm the arbitration award at the trial court. In response, Tarlov filed a motion to modify or correct the award on the ground that the arbitrator acted in excess of his powers in awarding Safari attorney fees. The trial court ruled that the arbitrator's decision to apply Civil Section section 1717 was subject to judicial review, and concluded that the arbitrator had erred in failing to apply the definition of "prevailing party" contained in the parties' agreement. The trial court corrected the award by ruling that the definition of prevailing party contained in the parties' agreement applied and remanding the matter to the arbitrator for further proceedings to apply the agreement's definition of prevailing party in determining whether to award attorney fees. Safari filed a petition for writ of mandate requesting that the Court of Appeal direct the trial court to vacate its order correcting the arbitrator's award. The Court found that the record unambiguously demonstrated that Safari and Tarlov extensively briefed this very issue in the arbitration. In addition, there was no provision in the parties' arbitration agreement that "explicitly and unambiguously limited" the arbitrator's power to determine the applicability of section 1717 in awarding attorney fees. Under these circumstances, the arbitrator acted within the scope of his powers in applying the definition of prevailing party found in section 1717, subdivision (b)(1) in awarding Safari attorney fees. Further, any error that the arbitrator may have committed would have constituted legal error, which was not subject to correction in the trial court. Accordingly, the Court granted Safari's petition and directed the trial court to vacate its order correcting the arbitration award, and to conduct further proceedings.
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