California, United States of America
The following excerpt is from Abregov v. Lawrence, G056866 (Cal. App. 2020):
If the situation is other than as described in the previous paragraph and "[i]f any party recovers other than monetary relief . . . , the 'prevailing party' shall be as determined by the [trial] court." ( 1032(a)(4).) In that case, the trial court has discretion to deny the prevailing party its costs or to apportion them. (Ibid.) But the trial court is without discretion to determine no party has prevailed.2 Trial courts are required to make a prevailing party determination in every action. (Charton v. Harkey (2016) 247 Cal.App.4th 730, 738.)
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