John Bryant Lawson v. WILLIAM M. LAWSON, Jr., individually

NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
JOHN BRYANT LAWSON,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
WILLIAM M. LAWSON, Jr., individually,
and in his capacities as Trustee of the
William M. Lawson Irrevocable Trust dated
12/17/1997; SHARON ONDREYCO, M.D.,
individually, and in her capacities as Trustee
of the William M. Lawson Irrevocable Trust
dated 12/17/1997,
Defendants-Appellees.
No. 15-17283
D.C. No. 3:14-cv-00345-WGC
MEMORANDUM*
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the District of Nevada
William G. Cobb, Magistrate Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted June 12, 2018
San Francisco, California
Before: SCHROEDER, GOULD, and DIAZ,** Circuit Judges.
* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
** The Honorable Albert Diaz, United States Circuit Judge for the U.S.
Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, sitting by designation.
FILED
JUN 26 2018
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS

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John Lawson (“John”) sued his brother William Lawson (“Bill”) and sister-in-
law Sharon Ondreyco (“Sharon”) (collectively, the “Trustees”), arguing that they
acted improperly during their tenure as trustees of a trust (“Trust”) that benefited
John and seeking to rescind a 2013 settlement agreement (“Agreement”) and
release of liability. After a bench trial, the trial court entered judgment in favor of
the Trustees, holding that the Agreement could not be rescinded under a theory of
(1) illegality, (2) coercion, or (3) undue influence. John appeals only the trial
court’s rulings that there was no undue influence or illegality, as well as an order
awarding attorneys’ fees to the Trustees. See Smith v. Marsh, 194 F.3d 1045, 1052
(9th Cir. 1999). We review the trial court’s findings of fact for clear error and its
conclusions of law de novo. Microsoft Corp. v. Motorola, Inc., 795 F.3d 1024,
1038 (9th Cir. 2015). We affirm.
The trial court applied the California Probate Code test for undue influence.
Any error it made in assigning the burden of proof to John was invited by John
who stated that he “unquestionably” and “obviously” bore the burden of proof.
See Sovak v. Chugai Pharm. Co., 280 F.3d 1266, 1270 (9th Cir.), amended on
denial of reh’g, 289 F.3d 615 (9th Cir. 2002); Deland v. Old Republic Life Ins. Co.,
758 F.2d 1331, 1336 (9th Cir. 1985). And we conclude that none of the factors for
undue influence—(1) the “vulnerability of the victim,” (2) the “influencer’s
apparent authority,” (3) the “actions or tactics used by the influencer,” and (4) the

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“equity of the result”—in combination or separately weighs significantly in favor
of a holding of undue influence. See Cal. Welf. & Inst. Code § 15610.70(a)(1)–
(4). We affirm the district court’s decision that there was no undue influence.
California Probate Code § 16004.5(a), which forms the basis of John’s
illegality argument, prohibits only releases of liability obtained in exchange for a
“required” distribution. But here the trial court explicitly found that a distribution
was not conditioned on the release of liability. And under the Trust terms, there
were no mandatory distributions to John. We agree with the trial court that the
Agreement cannot be rescinded on the basis of illegality.
The Agreement provides for an award of attorneys’ fees to a prevailing party
in an action stemming from a dispute over the enforcement of the Agreement and
the trial court awarded the Trustees their attorneys’ fees here. The only grounds
John argues for reversing the award of attorneys’ fees is that Bill and Sharon
should not have been the prevailing parties. As that argument is unavailing
because they have prevailed on this appeal, there is no basis to reverse the award of
attorneys’ fees, and we affirm it.
AFFIRMED.

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