Meet Edward Nowakoski. Once a practicing attorney and trustee, he is now disbarred, on criminal probation, and has paid more than $542,000 in restitution. The final cherry on top? An additional $399,681 civil penalty from the probate court.

That final penalty is the focus of the California Court of Appeal’s partially published opinion in Moramarco

Probate Code section 859, our subject in a recent post, packs a punch in California trust litigation.  It awards double damages against someone who in bad faith wrongfully takes property from an elder, in bad faith takes property through undue influence, or who takes property through the commission of financial elder abuse.

While the