Flores v. Palacio CA4/3

Filed 10/29/26 Flores v. Palacio CA4/3 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115. IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA FOURTH APPELLATE DISTRICT DIVISION THREE BLANCA MARCELINA FLORES et al., G066214 Plaintiffs and Appellants, (Super. Ct. No. 30-2023- v. 01310086) LUZ MARIA PALACIO et al., OPINION Defendants and Respondents. Appeal from an order of the Superior Court of Orange County, Megan Wagner, Judge. Affirmed. Blanca Marcelina Flores and Rocio Gabriela Flores, in pro. per., for Plaintiffs and Appellants. Palacio & Associates and Jose A. Palacio for Defendant and Respondent Luz Maria Palacio. Norma Fabiola Reyes, Elia Guadalupe Solis, Luis Alonso Flores, and Alma Georgina de Garcia, in pro. per., for Defendants and Respondents.  This appeal concerns the allocation of guardian ad litem (GAL) fees and costs incurred in proceedings involving the parties’ elderly mother. Defendants Luz Maria Palacio, Norma Fabiola Reyes, Elia Guadalupe Solis, Luis Alonso Flores, and Alma Georgina de Garcia requested the court allocate the GAL fees to plaintiffs Blanca Marcelina Flores and Rocio Gabriela Flores. The court ultimately ordered plaintiffs to pay 68 percent of the GAL fees and costs. On appeal, plaintiffs contend the court erred by allocating the GAL fees and costs to them. We find no reversible error and affirm the order. STATEMENT OF FACTS I. THE REQUESTS FOR ELDER ABUSE RESTRAINING ORDERS In 2023, plaintiffs filed requests for elder abuse restraining orders and sought contact with their elderly mother. The opposing parties were plaintiffs’ six siblings, five of whom are defendants in this appeal. The court consolidated the cases for trial and appointed a GAL for the elderly mother. Based on the GAL’s recommendation, the court ordered professionally monitored visits for plaintiffs. The court later removed the monitored restriction on plaintiff Rocio Gabriela Flores, but it again reinstated the requirement due to plaintiffs’ conflicts with their siblings and their mother’s caregivers. In February 2025, the parties reached an agreement regarding visits with their mother. 2  II. THE GAL’S PETITION FOR FEES In March 2025, the GAL filed a petition for payment of her fees and costs from the mother’s estate. She also sought an order discharging her from her duties as the GAL. Her work included reviewing documents, conducting interviews, attending hearings, preparing reports, and assisting with a settlement regarding visitation. On the day after the GAL filed her petition, the mother passed away. In July 2025, defendants filed a joint declaration in opposition to the GAL’s petition. They argued plaintiffs (not the mother’s estate) should pay the GAL fees because plaintiffs’ allegations were baseless. A few days later, plaintiffs filed an opposition to defendants’ joint declaration. Among other things, they argued the underlying action was justified to protect their mother’s rights “following repeated denials, interference, and harassment during visitation attempts, as well as a pattern of manipulative and harmful conduct by [defendants].” III. THE COURT’S ORDER In September 2025, the court approved $70,620 in fees and $519.32 in costs incurred by the GAL. The court ordered 68 percent of those fees and costs to be paid, jointly and severally, by plaintiffs and 32 percent to be paid from the Flores Revocable Living Trust, dated April 24, 2007 (the Trust). In doing so, the court reviewed numerous filings and found the elderly mother wanted to have a relationship with all of her children, which “should have been accomplished much sooner and at far less expense than what 3 transpired.” The court believed plaintiffs bore “significant responsibility for the extent of the GAL fees incurred.” The court also discharged the GAL. In November 2025, the court dismissed the cases pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 631.8. Plaintiffs timely appealed from the court’s order allocating 68 percent of the GAL fees and costs to them. DISCUSSION I. MOTION TO DISMISS AND MOTION FOR SANCTIONS At the outset, we address defendant Luz Palacio’s motion to dismiss this appeal and motion for sanctions. She argues plaintiffs should have named the GAL and the Trust (not defendants) as respondents to this appeal because they are indispensable parties affected by the trial court’s order. Given their absence, she insists the appeal is void. She further argues sanctions are warranted because the appeal is frivolous, involves the wrong parties, and was filed solely to cause delay. The remaining defendants filed joinders to the motion to dismiss and motion for sanctions. This court subsequently ordered its clerk to notify the GAL that she could appear in this appeal as a respondent or real party in interest. This court also ordered the parties to identify the Trust’s trustee and to serve their briefs to the GAL and trustee. Upon receiving the trustee’s information, this court indicated its clerk would notify the trustee that he or she could appear in this appeal as a respondent or real party in interest. Because plaintiffs do not challenge the amount of fees awarded and only contest the court’s allocation of fees, the GAL and the Trust are not indispensable parties. Any other concerns regarding these parties were cured by this court’s order and the subsequent notice provided. We accordingly deny the motion to dismiss and motion for sanctions. 4  II. ALLOCATION OF THE GAL FEES AND COSTS Plaintiffs contend the court erred by ordering them to pay 68 percent of the GAL fees and costs. As discussed below, plaintiffs have not demonstrated any error. A. Applicable Law and Standard of Review Probate Code section 1003, subdivision (c) provides: “The reasonable expenses of the guardian ad litem, including compensation and attorney’s fees, shall be determined by the court and paid as the court orders, either out of the property of the estate involved or by the petitioner or from any other source as the court orders.”1 (Italics added.) Where, as here, a statute provides for fees, we review the trial court’s order for abuse of discretion. (Kasperbauer v. Fairfield (2009) 171 Cal.App.4th 229, 234.) We presume the court’s order is correct, and plaintiffs must affirmatively demonstrate error. (Randall v. Mousseau (2016) 2 Cal.App.5th 929, 935.) B. No Abuse of Discretion Here, plaintiffs raise numerous challenges to the court’s allocation of the GAL fees and costs. We address each in turn below. 1. No Evidence of an Estate-Based Payment Structure Plaintiffs insist a prior judge initially ordered the GAL fees to be paid from the mother’s estate. Plaintiffs conclude the court erred “by reallocating . . . the GAL fees to [them] without statutory authority and without modifying the original estate-based payment structure established at the time of the GAL’s appointment.” Plaintiffs likewise argue a successor judge cannot alter a prior order without proper legal grounds. But plaintiffs 1 All further statutory references are to the Probate Code. 5 cite no portion of the record evidencing the purported “original estate-based payment structure.” As plaintiffs concede, the record also contains no reporter’s transcript of the hearing where a prior judge purportedly ordered the GAL fees to be paid from the estate. Plaintiffs accordingly cannot demonstrate any error on these grounds. (Randall v. Mousseau, supra, 2 Cal.App.5th at p. 935 [“[f]ailure to provide an adequate record on an issue requires that the issue be resolved against appellant”].) 2. Plaintiffs’ Responsibility for the GAL Fees Plaintiffs argue the court never found they engaged in conduct that warranted fee-shifting. To the contrary, the court did make such a finding. It explained the elderly mother wanted to have a relationship with all her children. The court added: “[T]o the extent the litigation accomplished that goal by creating rules to allow visits while protecting the elder and her assets, the elder benefitted. However, the [c]ourt further finds that this could and should have been accomplished much sooner and at far less expense than what transpired, and that [plaintiffs] bear significant responsibility for the extent of the GAL fees incurred.” (Italics added.) Plaintiffs further claim the court misattributed litigation complexity and delay to them. Instead, plaintiffs argue the complexity of the action was due to the court’s case-management decisions—i.e., consolidating the petitions and continuing the matter to allow the GAL to complete her investigation. But plaintiffs do not explain how the court’s consolidation caused any complexity or delay. Plaintiffs filed several petitions against their siblings. Consolidation of the petitions streamlined the proceedings and reduced the potential for duplicative proceedings. As to any continuance related to the GAL’s investigation, plaintiffs do not point to any citations in the record as required by California Rules of Court, rule 8.204(a)(1)(C). “It is 6 not the task of this court to search the record for evidence that supports the statements in an appellate brief; it is the responsibility of [the parties] to cite this court to the record evidence.” (In re Marriage of Tharp (2010) 188 Cal.App.4th 1295, 1310, fn. 3.) 3. Defendants’ Purported Responsibility for the GAL Fees Plaintiffs suggest defendants caused “a substantial portion of the procedural activity” through their repetitive filings, litigation over collateral matters, and requested continuances. Plaintiffs point to five nearly identical declarations filed by defendants in support of an ex parte application to continue trial.2 Plaintiffs also claim “a document submitted by [an] attorney . . . appears to have been altered using white-out and filed under [defendant] Luis Flores’s name.” None of these documents demonstrates defendants were responsible for the complexity of the proceedings or a significant portion of the GAL fees. Plaintiffs’ assertion that defendants sought multiple continuances is also unsupported by their record citations. Plaintiffs only point to one requested trial continuance due to a defendant’s medical needs. Shortly after, plaintiff Blanca Marcelina Flores dismissed that defendant 2 Plaintiffs filed a motion to augment the record with these declarations, which were filed in the Superior Court of Orange County, case No. 30-2023-01309940-PR-OP-CMC. We construe the motion as a request for judicial notice and grant the request as to these declarations. Plaintiffs also seek to augment the record to include a GAL report dated August 10, 2023, a February 3, 2025 minute order, a September 27, 2023 declaration and corresponding proof of service, and an October 2, 2023 response filed by plaintiff Rocio Gabriela Flores. We deny the remainder of plaintiffs’ motion because the documents are unnecessary to the resolution of this appeal. 7 from the action. These circumstances, without more, do not support attributing any of the GAL fees to defendants as opposed to plaintiffs. 4. Plaintiffs’ Ability to Pay and Punitive Sanctions Plaintiffs assert the court erred by not considering their ability to pay. Not so. Plaintiffs never asked the court to consider their financial circumstances in allocating the GAL fees and costs. The cases they cite also do not suggest the court had a sua sponte duty to do so under the circumstances of this case. (In re Marriage of Cheriton (2001) 92 Cal.App.4th 269, 318 [trial court was required to consider needs of requesting spouse and the ability to pay of spouse against whom an award of attorney fees was sought]; Walker v. Superior Court (1991) 53 Cal.3d 257 [including no relevant discussion about ability to pay].) Plaintiffs further insist the fee allocation is an improper punitive sanction because they engaged in no misconduct and filed their petitions out of concern for their mother. But the court’s fee allocation was not a sanction and did not require a finding of misconduct. Instead, section 1003, subdivision (c) expressly gave the court broad discretion to order the GAL fees and costs to be paid from the estate, the petitioner, or from any other source. Consistent with the statute, the court allocated a portion of the GAL fees to plaintiffs because of their “significant responsibility for the extent of the GAL fees incurred.” The absence of misconduct does not demonstrate the allocation was punitive. 5. Due Process Plaintiffs next argue they had no notice they could be personally responsible for the GAL fees. The record indicates otherwise. In March 2025, the GAL filed a petition for fees and costs. In July 2025, defendants requested the court order plaintiffs to pay the GAL fees. Plaintiffs opposed 8 defendants’ request. After the parties submitted on their papers, the court took the matter under submission. Because plaintiffs had the opportunity to oppose defendants’ request, they cannot claim they lacked notice. Plaintiffs similarly contend plaintiff Rocio Gabriela Flores’ due process rights were violated because she was not a party to the case when the GAL was appointed and performed some work on the case. They claim the court’s order “did not distinguish between the six petitions originally filed by [plaintiff Blanca Marcelina Flores] and [plaintiff Rocio Gabriela Flores’] later- filed single petition, nor did it account for the fact that substantial GAL services had already been performed before [plaintiff Rocio Gabriela Flores] became a party.” Other than these conclusory assertions, plaintiffs do not identify the GAL services actually performed before plaintiff Rocio Gabriela Flores’ involvement or cite to any relevant portion of the record. (California Rules of Court, rule 8.204(a)(1)(C) [a brief must “[s]upport any reference to a matter in the record by a citation to the volume and page number of the record where the matter appears”].) Plaintiffs also never asked the trial court to consider plaintiff Rocio Gabriela Flores’ later involvement in the action. We therefore decline to consider this argument. Plaintiffs further assert the court violated their due process rights because they did not have an opportunity to participate in an order to show cause (OSC) hearing. As plaintiffs properly note, the court wanted to review the entire court file to determine an appropriate allocation of the GAL fees. The court invited the parties to file any objections to its consideration of the court file and scheduled an OSC hearing on the issue. According to the court’s minute order, the court would deem the issue stipulated and vacate the OSC if the parties did not file any objections. No party filed any objections, but the court proceeded with an OSC hearing where defendants 9 and the GAL were present. The court subsequently considered the court file and issued its ruling. We find no reversible error because plaintiffs do not explain what they would have done differently had they participated in the OSC or how their alleged lack of participation affected the court’s fee allocation. 6. The Alleged Fiduciary Conflict Plaintiffs argue the court erred by not addressing the fiduciary conflict created by defendant Luis Flores’ dual role as both a defendant in the litigation and trustee of the Trust. Plaintiffs did not raise this contention in the trial court and do not explain why the issue can be raised for the first time on appeal. The argument is therefore forfeited. (Meridian Financial Services, Inc. v. Phan (2021) 67 Cal.App.5th 657, 699.) Regardless, plaintiffs do not adequately explain how any fiduciary conflict affected the GAL’s services or fee allocation. We therefore have no basis to conclude the court abused its discretion by not expressly considering the alleged fiduciary conflict. 7. Defendants’ Joint Declaration Plaintiffs suggest the court should not have relied on defendants’ joint declaration because it was procedurally defective. They complain that the joint declaration “purported to represent the unified position of multiple [defendants],” but the attorney who filed the joint declaration only represented one of the defendants. Plaintiffs further emphasize defendants electronically signed the joint declaration, and one defendant signed even though she was previously dismissed from the case. Once again, plaintiffs did not raise any of these objections below. In fact, they opposed defendants’ joint declaration on the merits. Plaintiffs accordingly forfeited any procedural challenge to the joint declaration. 10  8. Fees for a Related Request Plaintiffs argue the court improperly allocated fees to them for work performed on matters outside the scope of the GAL’s appointment. They rely on a request for elder abuse temporary restraining orders (the TRO) filed by one defendant against plaintiffs in January 2025. Plaintiffs suggest the GAL’s work on the TRO was not within the scope of her appointment. Contrary to plaintiffs’ contention, the TRO was related to plaintiffs’ case. Indeed, the defendant explained he filed the TRO because there would be “no working orders” addressing plaintiffs’ visitation if the court dismissed plaintiffs’ action. Plaintiffs do not adequately explain how the GAL’s work on this TRO was improper. 9. The GAL’s Investigative Process Plaintiffs claim the court’s fee allocation was based on a record “shaped by a structurally compromised GAL process.” They complain that two defendants served as interpreters for their mother and the court authorized one defendant’s attorney to serve as an interpreter. Plaintiffs also contend the GAL ignored their evidence, failed to contact their witnesses, and issued reports that were unfavorable to them. These contentions concern the merits of the underlying proceedings. They do not suggest the court erred in its allocation of the GAL fees. Finally, plaintiffs argue the cumulative effect of all the above errors requires reversal. Because we reject plaintiffs’ primary contentions of error on appeal, there was no cumulative error. Plaintiffs have not established the court’s allocation of the GAL fees and costs was outside the bounds of reason. 11  DISPOSITION The order is affirmed. Defendants shall recover their costs incurred on appeal. SERVINO, J. WE CONCUR: MOTOIKE, P. J. DELANEY, J. 12