Separate Appeal on Attorneys Fees Award After Judgment

An order awarding attorneys' fees, if made after judgment, is separately appealable. (Soldate v. Fidelity National Financial, Inc. (1998) 62 Cal. App. 4th 1069, 1073 72 Cal. Rptr. 2d 404; see Code Civ. Proc., 904.1, subd. (a)(2).) "Where several judgments and/or orders occurring close in time are separately appealable (e.g., judgment and order awarding attorney fees), each appealable judgment and order must be expressly specified--in either a single notice of appeal or multiple notices of appeal--in order to be reviewable on appeal." (Eisenberg et al., Cal. Practice Guide: Civil Appeals and Writs (The Rutter Group 1998). This rule was held not to bar review of a fee award in Grant v. List & Lathrop (1992) 2 Cal. App. 4th 993 3 Cal. Rptr. 2d 654, because the original judgment there declared the prevailing party entitled to fees, while leaving the amount blank. The reviewing court held that such a judgment "subsumes" a subsequent order fixing the amount of fees, so that an appeal from the original judgment confers appellate jurisdiction over the later order. (Id. at p. 997.) The court emphasized, however, that the entitlement to fees had been expressly determined in the first judgment and was therefore not a purely collateral issue, separately tried. (Ibid.)