Source: http://caccp.blogspot.com/2016/06/
Timestamp: 2017-08-19 03:28:13
Document Index: 113908678

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 391', '§ 2034', '§ 2034', '§ 27366', '§ 391', '§ 391', '§ 391']

111 North Hill Street: June 2016
Rand Resources v. City of Carson, No. B264496 (D2d1 May 31, 2016)
Plaintiff in this case alleges that the City of Carson breached its agreement with his company to make him its exclusive agent to negotiate Carson’s (unsuccessful) effort to lure an NFL team to the City. He also claims that the other agent the city supposedly dealt with interfered with his contract. For some inexplicable reason, the City managed to convince the trial court to dismiss the case as a SLAPP.
The Court of Appeal shows a lot of patience in reversing. Because the whole thing boils down to one key point: Just because speech about a controversy can be evidence does not mean that the claim arises from that speech. Public discussion of a redevelopment plan is protected activity. Breaching a redevelopment contract is not. That is the case even if in proving the breach of contract, some evidence regarding what was said about the plan in public fora is relevant evidence. As the court explains, the anti-SLAPP statute is not implicated when any protected speech is “merely a reference to a category of evidence that plaintiffs have to prove the elements of their claims, including interference and damages, not the gravamen of the cause of action.”
Posted by Michael Shipley at 9:41 AM No comments:
Labels: 425.16, anti-SLAPP, arising from, california code of civil procedure, city of carson, rand resources
Attorney and Clients arbitrated a fee dispute under the Mandatory Fee Arbitration Act. The Arbitrator awarded $0, finding that Attorney’s services were worth less than he had billed. They were, instead, worth a lesser amount, which just happened to be exactly what Client had paid.
But Clients hadn’t paid as much as the Arbitrator thought. He apparently relied on a mistaken document. Attorney noted the mistake. And Clients, to their credit, basically admitted it. But the Arbitrator refused to modify his award.
Attorney moved to vacate the award; Clients to confirm it. Clients also asked for their fees on confirmation, based on a fee provision in the retainer agreement. In addition to the payment mistake, Attorney claimed that Arbitrator had failed to disclose that a bunch of his recent work entailed auditing legal bills, which is Attorney claims is a significantly pro-client job for a fee arbitrator that it merited disclosure. The trial court refused to vacate the award on wither grounds and gave Clients their fees, although he cut their fee counsel’s hourly rates and hours significantly.
Posted by Michael Shipley at 7:58 PM No comments:
Labels: arbitrator conflicts, baxter, bias, block, california code of civil procedure, fee arbitration, motion to vacate, vacation of arbitration awards
Bower v. Bower, No. G050468 (D4d3, as modified, May 15, 2016)
Another one where I don’t have much to say. But Justice Bedsworth’s modified opinion adds a quip at the beginning with a quote from Lord Kelvin—he of the negative 273 degrees fame. Not sure I have ever seen an opinion modified to do that before.
Posted by Michael Shipley at 12:48 AM No comments:
Labels: bower, lord kelvin, modified opinions
Jimenez v. Roseville City Sch. Dist., No. C075366 (D3 May 19, 2016)
This personal injury case doesn’t offer much insight on civil procedure. It does, however, involve the testimony of a break dancing expert, FWIW.
Posted by Michael Shipley at 12:28 AM No comments:
Labels: break dancing, city of roseville, electric bugaloo, expert testimony, jiminez
Gerwan Farming v. Agric. Labor Relations Board, No. F069896 (D5 May 9, 2016)
Interesting case that deals with when the Legislature can bypass the superior courts and provide for a direct review by an appellate court of an administrative decision.
Labels: ALRB, Art. VI s 10, california constitution, gerwan farming, records access, subject matter jurisdiction
Vexatious Litigants Don't Need Pre-Filing Leave When They Get Sued
John v. Superior Court, No. S222726 (May 5, 2016).
Code of Civil Procedure § 391.7 permits a court to enter an order requiring a pro se litigant deemed to be vexatious to get pre-filing permission before “filing any new litigation in the courts of this state.” “New litigation” has been read to include appeals from trail court cases where the vexatious plaintiff lost. The cases, however, have generally focused on pro se plaintiffs. (It is plaintiffs, after all, who generally “file new litigation.”) But if “new litigation” includes appeals, what happens when a vexatious litigant gets sued, loses, and tries, pro se, to appeal? Does she still need pre-filing permission to appeal? The authority on this issue is apparently unclear, so the Supreme Court granted review to settle it.
In a unanimous decision by Justice Chin, the Court notes that the statutory scheme generally reflects a Legislative understanding that a vexatious litigant is a pro se plaintiff. In particular, the statutes repeatedly refer to a “defendant” as the vexee, not the vexor. While repeated amendments made clear that the rule applied to opening new appeals, they nonetheless appear consistently premised on the idea that the vexatious appellant is a plaintiff too. So the answer to the question is no. No permission is required.
Labels: 391.7, john, mandamus, pro se, superior court, vexatious litigants
Osborne v. Todd Farm Serv., No. B260280 (D2d6 May 2, 2016)
Plaintiff was injured when an allegedly defective hay bale she was standing on fell apart. She sued two Defendants—the Supplier and a company she claimed had manufactured the bale. None of the records in the case identified the source. And while there are apparently features of hay bales that would clue one into where they were manufactured, that would require expert testimony. Plaintiff, however, didn’t timely disclose a hay source expert under Code of Civil Procedure § 2034.260. She instead waited and designated herself as a “supplemental” expert under § 2034.280. But as Fairfax v. Lords, 138 Cal. App. 4th 1019 (2006) explains, that’s a no-no. You can’t sandbag in disclosing experts as “supplemental” if you had every reason to anticipate that they would be needed in at the time of the original disclosures. So the trial court struck her designation.
Posted by Michael Shipley at 10:33 AM No comments:
Labels: 1220, 1222, 2034.260, 2034.280, 403, 801(d), california code of civil procedure, california evidence code, expert disclosure, expert opinion, in limine, terminating sanctions
Posted by Michael Shipley at 9:44 PM No comments:
Li. v. Yan, No. A144994 (D1d2 May 2, 2016)
This is a collections case. Like most collections cases that progress to an appeal, the facts are convoluted and difficult to follow. But the court’s rulings aren’t. First, when the debtor is subject to a judgment debtor exam, the creditor doesn’t need to personally serve a subpoena demanding that he bring docs to the exam. Service in the same manner as applies to pre-judgment party discovery (e.g., mail service to counsel) will suffice.
Second, although California recognizes a privilege against the discovery of tax returns, it can be overridden in difficult collection cases by a “public policy greater than that of the confidentiality of tax returns.” To wit, the “policy is to prevent fraud against creditors. And against lenders. And perhaps against the court.” The record here showed that debtor had engaged in a bunch of pretty egregious conduct designed to frustrate the collections process. Under the circumstances, the court finds the privilege overridden.
Posted by Michael Shipley at 11:13 AM 1 comment:
Labels: collections, judgment debtor exam; privileges, judgment debtors, li, service, subpoena, tax privilege, yan
Having a Bankrupt Co-Fraudster Doesn't Get You Off the Hook
Patel v. Crown Diamonds, Inc., No. G051439 (D4d3 Apr. 29, 2016)
A bunch of guys and their company allegedly swindled a Widow out of her money. One of the guys went BK and had all his debts discharged, over Widow’s objection. But the others didn’t go BK. Nor did their company. The widow sued them for fraud. Defendants moved for sanctions, claiming that the case was frivolous because the rejection of Widow’s objection to the discharge of BK guy’s debts barred the claims under res judicata. For some crazy reason, the trial court agreed, struck plaintiff’s complaint, and awarded Defendants over $12k for their fees.
The Court of Appeal reverses. A discharge against one party to a multi-defendant tort does not discharge the others unless they are in privity. And as the Supreme Court recently explained in the DKN case, ordinary joint tortfeasors like co-fraudsters are not in privity for preclusion purposes. If three guys commit fraud and one of them gets out—whether by discharge in BK, settlement, release, or judgment—res judicata doesn’t bar claims against the others. Nor would collateral estoppel apply because there was no common issue decided adversely to Widow’s claim in that proceeding.
Labels: bankruptcy discharge, claim preclusion, collateral estoppel, crown diamonds, issue preclusion, patel, privity, res judicata
Public Records Are Not Supposed to Be a Profit Center
Cal. Public Records Research, Inc. v. County of Stanislaus, No. F070601 (D5 Apr. 28, 2016)
Section § 27366 of the Government Code says that counties can charge a rate for the copying of public records sufficient to cover their costs. Stanislaus County charges three bucks for the first page, and two for each page thereafter. There is, however, no evidence that it actually costs that much to fulfill a public records request. So the Court of Appeal reverses a trial court’s dismissal of an administrative mandamus case and remands for the trial court to see what the evidence actually is.
Labels: access to courts, california public records research, public records act, records access, stanislaus
Friends of Maritn’s Beach v. Martin’s Beach 1 LLC, No. A142035 (D1d2 Apr. 27, 2016)
The dispute is about the right of public access to tidelands. It has basically nothing to do with California Civil procedure. But it turns on the interpretation of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which is kinda awesome.
Labels: california republic, mexico, treaty of guadalupe hildago
Posted by Michael Shipley at 9:13 PM No comments:
Goodrich v. Sierra Vista Regional Med. Ctr., No. B259726 (D2d6 Apr. 27, 2016)
Plaintiff, pro per, keeps trying to re-litigate the denial of a writ of administrative mandamus in which she unsuccessfully sought to challenge a hospital’s termination of her staff privileges. (Notably, she never appealed the initial denial.) On her second go at it, the trial court warned her that any more meritless filings could result in her being declared a vexatious litigant. She nonetheless did it again. So the curt made good on its word. It found that Plaintiff was a vexatious litigatant, under Code of Civil Procedure § 391(b)(2) and (3), and required her to post a $25k bond and obtain pre-filing leave before filing any more motions or actions.
The Court of Appeal affirms over a substantial evidence challenge. Under § 391(b)(2), one way to be a vexatious litigant is to repeatedly attempt to relitigate an issue or claim that has been finally determined against the person. Plaintiff contents that “repeatedly” requires more than three. But the court—relying on dicta in Morton v. Wagner, 156 Cal. App. 4th 963 (2007)—holds that three can be enough. So long as the record supports that “repeatedly relitigating issues previously decided in [a prior] judgment unreasonably burdened both [the opposing party] and the court, which had to expend time and other resources addressing the motions and appearing at unnecessary hearings.” Which was the case here.
For belt and suspenders, the court also affirms the finding under § 391(b)(3), which alternatively defines a vexatious litigant as one who “repeatedly files unmeritorious motions, pleadings, or other papers, conducts unnecessary discovery, or engages in other tactics that are frivolous or solely intended to cause unnecessary delay.” Filing repeated and fruitless motions to collaterally attack a final judgment meets that standard. Particularly when Plaintiff continued to do so even after being admonished by the trial court.
Posted by Michael Shipley at 8:24 PM No comments:
Labels: 391, california code of civil procedure, Goodrich, res judicata, sierra vista regional medical center, vexatious litigants