## Facts

- Dolores Sampson and Beverly Cybulski were injured in a December 1996 automobile collision caused by Milo Langberg, an insured of National Farmers Union Property and Casualty Company (NFU).
- In 2001, assisted by a pro bono attorney, the claimants offered to settle their bodily-injury claims for $125,000; NFU rejected the offer.
- On counsel’s advice, the claimants retained a personal-injury lawyer on a contingency-fee basis.
- About fourteen months later, NFU settled the bodily-injury claims for $125,000, the same amount as the earlier offer.
- By the time of settlement, the claimants had incurred about $43,500 in attorney fees.
- The claimants also alleged NFU delayed resolving Sampson’s property-damage claim, despite reasonably clear liability, to gain leverage in settling the bodily-injury claims.

## Issues

1. Whether attorney fees incurred to obtain an underlying settlement after an insurer rejects an earlier identical settlement offer are recoverable as “actual damages” in a private action under Montana’s Unfair Trade Practices Act (UTPA), Mont. Code Ann. § 33-18-242.

## Decision

- The Montana Supreme Court affirmed summary judgment for NFU.
- Attorney fees incurred in pursuing the underlying bodily-injury and property-damage claims were not recoverable as “actual damages” under § 33-18-242.
- The statute’s authorization of attorney fees for prosecuting the UTPA action did not convert underlying claim-prosecution fees into compensable damages.

## Legal Principles

- Under Mont. Code Ann. § 33-18-242, “actual damages” and “attorney fees” are separate remedial categories; fee shifting exists for the UTPA litigation itself, not for fees incurred to obtain the underlying settlement.
- Absent clear statutory language, Montana follows the rule that each party bears its own attorney fees; courts will not expand a statutory fee remedy beyond the legislature’s expressed terms.
- Costs of obtaining a settlement (including contingent fees in the underlying claim) are not treated as an independent compensable injury under the UTPA’s “actual damages” provision.

## Conclusion

Attorney fees incurred to secure an underlying insurance settlement—even where the insurer later pays the same amount previously offered—are not recoverable as “actual damages” in a private UTPA action; the statute limits fee recovery to reasonable fees for litigating the UTPA claim itself.


Sampson v. Nat’l Farmers Union Prop. & Cas. Co., 144 P.3d 797 (Mont. 2006)