Dooley v. Dooley

In Dooley v. Dooley, 1999 SD 136, 601 N.W.2d 277, 282, the Court stressed the importance of itemized attorney fee requests. The Court said: "Without any itemization or time frame for $ 3,641.64 of Wife's attorney's fees the trial court did not have sufficient information upon which to conclude that an award of $ 6,422.64 was reasonable. Kappenman v. Kappenman, 522 N.W.2d 199, 204 (SD 1994). This also makes it impossible for us to cogently review the issue. Accordingly, we reverse the award of attorney's fees to Wife and remand the matter to the trial court in order to admit Wife's prior itemized attorney's fee statements into evidence and determine a reasonable fee based upon them and the itemized statement already received." Id.