JOSE MONTERROSA v. HILA ELIMELECH - According to the Los Angeles County online case summary for the matter, as well as documents in the court file, plaintiff's attorney of record for this matter is listed as Mary Dumont.

What happened in this matter was jaw dropping. Grab some popcorn and follow along to see why attorney Mary Dumont was involved in over $80,000 in payments for sanctions and legal fees - to date. In our opinion, Ms. Dumont might be the last attorney you would ever want to hire. From the tentative ruling and other records this is what happened:

Attorney Mary Dumont represents the plaintiff in this case.

The plaintiff filed a wage and hour lawsuit against Sonic Towing and two individuals associated with the company. Sonic is a corporation. The lawsuit filed by attorney Dumont also sued Sonic's owner and his wife.

Note: At the outside there is a potentially huge problem here. If the corporation is the employer that is who will owe wages. That is why businesses incorporate, to protect individual owners from personal liability. We believe it would be rare for an owner of a corporation to also be liable for a wage and hour claim. We cannot think of any scenario where any competent attorney would think it was a good idea to sue his wife. It just smacks of being unnecessarily malicious to do this.

The wife of the stock owner of the corporation hiring the plaintiff was so obviously improperly sued she was dismissed on legal grounds by demurrer. In other words, the court could rule on the allegations Mary Dumont herself wrote in the complaint that the wife should be dismissed.

Not amused about wrongly being sued, the wife sued attorney Mary Dumont for malicious prosecution.

Attorney (and now a defendant) Mary Dumont then filed a SLAPP motion against the malicious prosecution lawsuit, claiming it was legal protected activity to originally sue the wife.

Second Note: We have not reviewed that motion but this does not seem to be a good argument. Otherwise, no one could effectively be sued for malicious prosecution and it would be open season to unnecessarily and maliciously sue wives and other people to brow-beat them into settlements without having any repercussion.

The judge apparently agreed with our assessment and denied Ms. Dumont's SLAPP motion.

The parties then entered into a settlement of the original wage and hour claim and the wife dismissed her lawsuit against attorney Dumont.

End of story?

Pfft.

We're just getting started.

Representing the same plaintiff, attorney Dumont then sued Sonic's owner (again), and his wife (again), and their attorney for malicious prosecution.

WTF?

Third Note: This falls under the you have to be kidding category. On its face this seems to be a terrible idea and in our view no competent attorney would file such as lawsuit. Even an incompetent attorney would not file this lawsuit.

But file it Dumont did.

So the defendants filed their own SLAPP motion claiming they were being sued only because the wife had originally sued for malicious prosecution.

Fourth Note: Again, it bears repeating the wife seems to have a good complaint about not being named in the original lawsuit, and the parties had supposedly settled their issues.

The judge granted the SLAPP motion and struck the lawsuit.

As we said ... we are still just getting started.

Attorney Mary Dumont then filed a motion to keep a debtors asset examination from happening. That was denied. Seems to us like it would obviously be denied.

Mary Dumont, Esq., then filed a petition for supersedeas. We had to search Google for what that was. Basically, it is a request to stop all court proceedings because otherwise there would be irreparable harm during an appeal. We cannot imagine this would be granted, and apparently it was not. In our opinion the idea seems frivolous, but we have not reviewed the motion.

The judge had to issue a bench warrant for Dumont's client to be arrested and forced to appear at a judgment debtor's examination of his assets.

Then Ms. Dumont filed a second motion to keep the examination from happening, apparently also denied.

The judge then hammered attorney Mary Dumont for $4750 in sanctions.

It is a huge amount.

We are not sure, but for this high amount of sanctions for this type of misconduct, the judge could have been required to report Mary Dumont to the California State Bar for discipline.

Dumont filed an appeal of the dismissal of the malicious prosecution lawsuit she filed.

The court of appeal unanimously rejected her arguments.

Some of comments from the appellate justices included that attorney Dumont's arguments were unconvincing and without merit.

Fifth Note: The appellate opinion refers to statements in a declaration Ms. Dumont filed that the opposing attorney made "religious curses" against the plaintiffs in the original case.

Sixth Note: The appellate court further notes Ms. Dumont has filed two disciplinary claims with the State Bar against the opposing attorney.

After the appeal the case was sent back to the Los Angeles trial court.

There the judge, in the tentative ruling we originally saw, laid down the war hammer.

The sanction for making an improper SLAPP complaint can be the payment of legal fees. This includes the fees for the appeal Dumont lost.

The judge awarded $76,071.25 in legal fees and costs.

Seventh Note: We consider the fees a type of sanction for bringing an improper SLAPP motion. By statute the fees can only be awarded against a party, not an attorney, even if the attorney is completely at-fault. So, technically, the $76,017.25 is awarded against the plaintiff only. But we are guessing Ms. Dumont's client will be making a legal malpractice claim against her, which she will be contacting her insurance company about.

Bottom line per the tentative order:

Attorney Mary Dumont has been personally sanctioned $4750. It may be reportable to the State Bar for discipline.

From her actions Ms. Dumont's client owes $76,071.25.

There is probably more entertainment to come. Maybe some more religious curses or a bench warrant for an arrest.

Would you hire Mary Dumont to be your attorney?

LOL.

From what we have read from the court wouldn't everyone think she is an incredibly awesome attorney who is not out of control?

Mary Dumont was admitted to the California Bar in 1985. Bar Number 121425.

Dumont Law Offices
165 Wool Street
San Francisco, California 94110

Law School: Hastings College of the Law