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DRAFT FOR ATTORNEY REVIEW — NOT FINAL

Electric Man, Inc. v. Charos, 179 Vt. 351 (2006)

Citation
Electric Man, Inc. v. Charos, 179 Vt. 351 (2006)
Parent Document
Electric Man, Inc. v. Charos, 179 Vt. 351 (2006)
Jurisdiction
Vermont (state)
Effective Date
2006-02-10

Full Text

937 chars
¶ 9. We addressed a very similar situation in L’Esperance v. Benware, 2003 VT 43, ¶¶ 22-25, 175 Vt. 292, 830 A.2d 675. In that case, the tenants made eight claims against their landlords, including consumer fraud for renting a house that was known to be in violation of health and safety codes. The jury awarded compensatory and *355punitive damages on this claim. The trial court awarded the tenants all of their attorneys’ fees under the Consumer Fraud Act, 9 V.S.A. § 2461(b), even though they prevailed on other claims, including claims that the landlords failed to return a security deposit and were negligent in renting the house with unsafe water. In response to the landlords’ argument that attorneys’ fees could not be awarded for time spent on non-Consumer-Fraud-Act claims, the court held that all of the claims involved a common core of facts that justified awarding fees for all time spent on the case. We affirmed, holding: