In Ramos v. Garcia, Plaintiff prevailed on a number of wage and hour claims against two of his former employers, but failed to prevail against a third defendant, whom the trial court deemed to be a manager and co-employee, not an employer. The trial court awarded attorneys’ fees to the third defendant pursuant to section 218.5 of the California Labor Code, which awards attorneys’ fees to “prevailing parties” in any action brought for the nonpayment of wages. Attorney fees under this Section may be awarded to non-employees only if the employee who brought the action did so in bad faith.

The Court of Appeals reversed the grant of attorneys’ fees to the third defendant because the defendant did not qualify as a “prevailing party” as defined by the relevant section. The Court reasoned that the third defendant being effectively sued as if he were an employer was sufficient to trigger the bad faith provision, a condition not met because Plaintiff’s recovery against the other defendants on most of the claims indicated a lack of bad faith.

The takeaway from this case is that plaintiffs who bring non-payment of wages claims in good faith against multiple defendants will not be responsible for paying attorneys’ fees, even if one of the defendants was mistakenly named in the action.

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