The Tort of Another Has Limits:

Horst Legal CounselAppellate Law, Business Litigation, Legal Updates, Real Estate Law

California Businesses Cannot Recover Every Legal Fee in Cascading Litigation Horst Legal Counsel | April 2026 Someone torpedoes your deal. You spend north of a million dollars in court forcing the sale through. You win. Then you sue the people who caused the mess in the first place, and you win again. But the second lawsuit cost you another $841,000 …

Grant v. Chapman University:

Horst Legal CounselAppellate Law, Business Litigation

Marketing “Face-to-Face” Experience Does Not Create Enforceable Contract for In-Person Classes When operations get disrupted, customers look for refunds. Students are no different. During COVID-era campus closures, many sued universities for tuition back based on an “implied promise” of in-person education. This California Court of Appeal just rejected this effort in a case involving Chapman University, finding that Chapman had …

When State Law Caps Penalties, Cities Can’t Add “Impoundment” as a Workaround: Mustaqeem v. City of San Diego

Horst Legal CounselAppellate Law, Municipal Law

California’s sidewalk vending statutes reflect a legislative tradeoff: local governments may regulate through objective health and safety rules, but enforcement is meant to stay within a deliberately narrow set of tools. Mustaqeem v. City of San Diego underscores what that bargain looks like in litigation. The decision is less about sidewalk vending in isolation and more about a familiar public-law …

California Court of Appeal Blesses Santa Barbara’s Move to Turn Disney+ Into a Local Tax Collector

Horst Legal CounselAppellate Law, Digital Law, tax law

When a city decides to tax streaming, the first reaction from many platforms is: you can’t really treat us like cable… can you? In Disney Platform Distribution v. City of Santa Barbara (B342211, Dec. 17, 2025, 2d Dist., Div. 6), the Court of Appeal said yes. It upheld Santa Barbara’s 5.75% video users tax as applied to Disney+, Hulu, and …