The case concerned whether two groups of plaintiffs were entitled to attorney fees and costs under 42 U.S.C. § 1988 after prevailing in a lawsuit that challenged a Bachelor Gulch Metropolitan District traffic regulation banning construction traffic from Strawberry Park subdivision roads. The district court had invalidated the regulation on state-law grounds and later dismissed the plaintiffs' added federal constitutional claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 as moot, but it awarded nearly $1 million in fees based on those federal claims. The appellate court reversed the fee award to Beaver Creek because it had added its substantive due process and equal protection claims only after the court had already ruled in its favor on the core state-law issues. It affirmed the award to Strawberry Park, however, because Strawberry Park's constitutional claims had been present from the outset, were supported by evidence that the regulation was arbitrary or pretextual, and therefore were not "obviously without merit" under the applicable test for substantiality. The matter was remanded solely to determine the amount of reasonable appellate fees due to Strawberry Park.
This case arose from a dispute over lien priorities on real property in Chaffee County after a series of loans, deeds of trust, and a subordination agreement between Colorado Capital Bank and Bent Tree, LLC. The district court dismissed certain declaratory judgment claims by Tomar Development and the Damyanovichs, holding that Colorado would likely follow the partial subordination approach, under which Bent Tree's foreclosure on the first deed of trust would extinguish the plaintiffs' junior liens. The plaintiffs sought interlocutory appellate review of that ruling and related orders under C.A.R. 4.2. The Colorado Court of Appeals denied the petition, concluding that the record did not demonstrate either that immediate review would promote a more orderly or final disposition of the litigation or that the orders involved controlling questions of law, given the presence of numerous other pending claims, the plaintiffs' ability to amend their pleadings, and the possibility that equitable theories could produce the same outcome.
In this workers' compensation case, claimant Jimmy Lassiter sought ongoing post-MMI medical benefits (known as Grover benefits) after a 2009 ALJ order awarded him permanent partial disability benefits based on a DIME physician's rating and recommendation for further treatment, following a 2007 work-related injury. The employer argued that Lassiter had waived those benefits by failing to request them at the PPD hearing, that the claim had closed, and that the ALJ's general reservation clause reserving undecided issues was insufficient to preserve the claim. A second ALJ agreed with the employer and denied the benefits, but the Industrial Claim Appeals Office Panel reversed, holding that the reservation clause preserved the issue. The Colorado Court of Appeals affirmed the Panel, ruling that the clause prevented waiver and allowed remand for a determination on the merits of the Grover benefits request.
This case involved Vulcan Power Company and its directors appealing a Colorado district court's refusal to give preclusive effect to an Oregon court's order compelling arbitration or to compel arbitration of counterclaims in a statutory action to remove corporate directors. The counterclaims, brought by former CEO Stephen Munson and shareholders, sought removal of directors partly on grounds related to Munson's termination. The Colorado Court of Appeals dismissed the portion of the appeal challenging the denial of issue preclusion for lack of jurisdiction under the Uniform Arbitration Act, as that issue did not arise from a motion to compel based on an arbitration agreement. It affirmed the refusal to compel arbitration, holding that the employment contract's arbitration clause applied only to contests of termination itself and did not cover the distinct statutory claims for director removal, which sought equitable relief rather than contract remedies and did not mirror arbitrable disputes.
This case concerns a post-dissolution dispute in which the husband sought to set aside or modify provisions of the 1994 divorce decree that divided marital property, specifically requiring him to pay a portion of his future Social Security benefits to the wife and to make monthly payments for her health insurance or care. The court held that the Social Security provision was void as it violated the anti-assignment clause of the federal Social Security Act and was preempted by the Supremacy Clause, consistent with rulings from other states, and that equitable estoppel did not bar the challenge. The court further determined that the health care payments were properly characterized as part of the property division rather than modifiable maintenance, based on the parties' explicit agreement language and the absence of contrary evidence of intent. The order was therefore affirmed in part and reversed in part, with remand for further proceedings on the marital property division.
In Sanderson v. American Family Mutual Insurance Co., the plaintiff sought damages for bad faith breach of an underinsured motorist policy after his insurer offered $30,000 to settle a claim that an arbitration panel later valued at over $850,000 (net of offsets). The district court granted summary judgment to the insurer and denied leave to add an exemplary damages claim. The Court of Appeals affirmed, holding that the insurer was entitled to judgment as a matter of law because the claims were fairly debatable on both factual questions of comparative fault and legal questions regarding PIP offsets, giving the insurer a reasonable basis to contest the amount owed without acting in bad faith. The court further concluded that the insurer's settlement offer and handling of the arbitration did not support a finding of bad faith on the record presented, rendering the exemplary damages amendment moot.