Title: Chen v. Los Angeles Truck Centers, LLC
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: S240245
State: California
Issuer: California Supreme Court
Date: July 22, 2019

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF 
CALIFORNIA 
 
HAIRU CHEN et al., 
Plaintiffs and Appellants, 
v. 
LOS ANGELES TRUCK CENTERS, LLC, 
Defendant and Respondent. 
 
S240245 
 
Second Appellate District, Division Eight 
B265304 
 
Los Angeles County Superior Court 
BC469935 
 
 
July 22, 2019 
 
Justice Chin authored the opinion of the Court, in which Chief 
Justice Cantil-Sakauye and Justices Corrigan, Liu, Cuéllar, 
Kruger, and Groban concurred. 
 
1 
CHEN v. LOS ANGELES TRUCK CENTERS, LLC 
S240245 
 
Opinion of the Court by Chin, J. 
 
In this tort action arising out of a fatal tour bus accident 
in Arizona, the parties initially included plaintiffs from China 
and defendants from both Indiana and California.  Asked to 
decide which jurisdiction’s law applied to the case, the trial court 
conducted the governmental interest test (see Reich v. Purcell 
(1967) 67 Cal.2d 551 (Reich)) and concluded that Indiana law 
governed.  Before trial, however, the plaintiffs accepted a 
settlement offer from the Indiana manufacturer of the tour bus 
and dismissed that defendant from the case.  We granted review 
to determine if the trial court should have reconsidered the 
previous choice of law ruling after that Indiana defendant was 
no longer a party.   
For reasons that follow, we conclude that the trial court 
was not required to reconsider the prior choice of law ruling 
based on the party’s settlement.  Because the trial court did not 
err by declining to reconsider the ruling, we reverse the Court of 
Appeal’s judgment.  
FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND 
 
The underlying action concerns a rollover bus accident on 
October 17, 2010 in Meadview, Arizona.  The bus passengers 
were ten Chinese tourists and their tour guide who were 
traveling from Las Vegas, Nevada for a day trip to the Grand 
Canyon in Arizona.  The driver of the bus, Zhi Lu, a California 
resident, worked for TBE International, Inc. (TBE), a California 
CHEN v. LOS ANGELES TRUCK CENTERS, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Chin, J. 
 
2 
tour company that owned and operated the 16-seat tour bus.  Lu 
drove the bus from Los Angeles, California and picked up the 
Chinese tourists at their Las Vegas hotel. 
 
While en route to the Grand Canyon, Lu drove the bus 
around a curve at a high rate of speed and lost control.  The bus 
rolled over twice.  The driver and tour guide were in the front 
seats, which were equipped with three-point seatbelts (lap and 
shoulder restraints).  Neither suffered any serious injury in the 
accident.  None of the passenger seats, however, were equipped 
with seatbelts of any kind.  Two passengers were killed.  One 
female passenger was impaled in the door mechanism; a male 
passenger was ejected from the bus and fatally fractured his 
skull.  Six other passengers were ejected from the bus and 
suffered injuries.  The remaining two passengers, who were not 
ejected, sustained injuries as well.  
 
In September 2011, the eight passengers and survivors of 
the two passengers who were killed (plaintiffs) filed an action in 
Los Angeles County Superior Court against two California-
based defendants, the tour bus company TBE, and the 
distributor who sold the tour bus to TBE, Los Angeles Truck 
Centers, LLC dba Buswest (Buswest), a California corporation 
with multiple locations nationwide.  Plaintiffs also sued the bus 
manufacturer, Forest River, Inc. (Forest River), an Indiana 
corporation that designed, manufactured, and modified the tour 
bus, and Starcraft, a division of Forest River.  Because the 
parties have referred to the buses as “Starcraft buses,” we refer 
to the manufacturer of the buses as Starcraft.  Unless otherwise 
noted, references to Starcraft necessarily include Forest River.  
In their operative second amended complaint, plaintiffs 
alleged causes of action for wrongful death, negligence, strict 
CHEN v. LOS ANGELES TRUCK CENTERS, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Chin, J. 
 
3 
products liability, loss of consortium, and negligent infliction of 
emotional distress.  That the driver, Lu, was at fault for the 
accident was not in dispute.  The main theories of plaintiffs’ 
action 
were 
that 
Starcraft 
negligently 
designed 
and 
manufactured the bus and that Buswest chose to order the bus 
without seatbelts, which would have prevented the deaths and, 
at the very least, would have minimized the injuries of the 
passengers in the rollover crash.   
In December 2012, TBE and Lu settled with plaintiffs for 
$5 million, in exchange for a full release of all claims against 
them.  One year later, after the governing two-year statute of 
limitations had already run (Code Civ. Proc., § 335.1), 
defendants Starcraft and Buswest (collectively, defendants) 
filed a “Joint Notice of Motion and Motion Regarding Choice of 
Law on Behalf of Defendants” to determine the choice of law.  In 
that motion, defendants alleged that plaintiffs’ claims 
“potentially implicate” four different jurisdictions, i.e., Indiana, 
Arizona, China, and California.  Defendants maintained that 
under the governmental interest test to determine the choice of 
law (see Reich, supra, 67 Cal.2d 551), Indiana law applied.  After 
considering the parties’ extensive briefing, the trial judge (Judge 
Kendig)1 granted defendants’ motion and concluded that 
Indiana law governed the case.  Plaintiffs filed a writ of mandate 
challenging the trial court’s ruling on the choice of law, which 
                                        
1  
Although it is generally not customary to identify trial 
judges by name in opinions, we have done so here when 
necessary to distinguish between Judge Kendig and Judge 
Czuleger, who was reassigned to the matter, and their 
respective rulings.  (See In re Marriage of Fajota (2014) 230 
Cal.App.4th 1487, 1491, fn. 2.) 
CHEN v. LOS ANGELES TRUCK CENTERS, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Chin, J. 
 
4 
the Court of Appeal denied based on plaintiffs’ failure to show 
entitlement to extraordinary relief.   
In August 2014, the same month the trial was originally 
set to begin, plaintiffs settled with Starcraft for $3.25 million, 
and, over Buswest’s opposition, Judge Kendig granted 
Starcraft’s motion for good faith settlement (Code Civ. Proc., § 
877.6).  After the settlement left California-based Buswest as 
the sole defendant, Buswest filed a motion for summary 
judgment under Indiana law, which the trial court denied.  The 
trial court also denied plaintiffs’ request that it reconsider its 
choice of law ruling.  The original trial date of August 18, 2014 
was vacated, and the trial date was continued.   
In November 2014, plaintiffs filed a “Motion in Limine No. 
4 to Apply California Law,” alleging that “[f]or choice-of-law 
purposes, plaintiffs’ settlement with the Indiana defendants has 
completely transformed the relevant legal landscape.”  On 
February 20, 2015, six weeks before trial was set to begin, a 
newly assigned trial judge (Judge Czuleger) denied the motion 
on procedural grounds, specifically declining to reconsider 
Judge Kendig’s choice of law ruling.  Judge Czuleger opined that 
he would deny on the merits as well, noting that plaintiffs’ 
motion did not present “any new or different facts justifying a 
reconsideration.”  On a final note, Judge Czuleger added that a 
choice of law determination “should not change at the last hour 
before trial because of settlement of certain parties.  The parties 
have prepared for trial based on a definitive ruling by the 
previous judge.  The parties should be able to rely on that ruling 
in their trial preparation.  The happenstance of a change in 
parties should not affect the law to be applied here.”   
CHEN v. LOS ANGELES TRUCK CENTERS, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Chin, J. 
 
5 
After the jury was sworn in on April 9, 2015, the trial 
proceeded under Indiana products liability law, which imported 
a negligence standard in the definition of a defective product.  
(See Ind. Code § 34-20-2-1 [seller may be liable if “user or 
consumer is in the class of persons that the seller should 
reasonably foresee as being subject to the harm caused by the 
defective condition” (italics added)]; id., § 34-20-2-2 [plaintiff 
“must establish that the manufacturer or seller failed to exercise 
reasonable care under the circumstances in designing the 
product” (italics added)].)  Plaintiffs focused on Buswest’s 
decision to order the bus without the $12 lap belts.  In its 
defense, Buswest contended its decision not to include seatbelts 
constituted an exercise of reasonable care because the federal 
National Highway Transportation Safety Administration 
standards did not require lap belts in this bus; the industry 
standard at the time was to not include seatbelts; and lap belts 
could cause serious injuries to passengers in frontal collisions, 
which were more common than rollover accidents.  
In a vote of 10 to two, the jury rendered a defense verdict 
on April 27, 2015.  It concluded that while Buswest was a 
manufacturer or seller of the bus under Indiana law, the bus 
was not in a “defective condition” at the time of the accident.  
Judgment was entered in favor of Buswest, and plaintiffs 
appealed.   
The Court of Appeal reversed.  First characterizing each 
side’s motion to determine the choice of law as a motion in 
limine, the Court of Appeal concluded that the trial court 
“should have fully reconsidered” the initial choice of law ruling 
because “once Starcraft had been dismissed from the case, any 
interest Indiana had in applying its law to Starcraft was no 
CHEN v. LOS ANGELES TRUCK CENTERS, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Chin, J. 
 
6 
longer at issue.”  It did not, however, consider the correctness of 
the trial court’s initial choice of law ruling.   
The Court of Appeal rejected Buswest’s contention that 
under Reich, supra, 67 Cal.2d 551, the choice of law is fixed at 
the time of the accident.  Rather, the court reasoned, “[t]he 
relevant interests cannot be accurately determined until the 
defendants, and the theories of liability alleged against them, 
are known—things that are only known for certain as the case 
gets closer to trial.”  The Court of Appeal applied the 
governmental interest test and determined that California law 
governed.  Finding the error prejudicial, the court reversed the 
judgment and remanded for a new trial governed by California 
products liability law.   
 
We granted review.  
DISCUSSION 
“Perhaps no legal subject has caused more consternation 
and confusion among the bench and bar than choice of law.”  
(Smith, Choice of Law in the United States (1987) 38 Hastings 
L.J. 1041 (Smith); see Bernhard v. Harrah’s Club (1976) 16 
Cal.3d 313, 321 [“endless variety of choice of law problems”].)  
“Unfortunately, the complexity of a legal concept is often 
directly proportional to its practical importance.  Choice of law 
is no exception.  The choice of law decision may determine the 
success or failure of a lawsuit, the amount of damages 
recoverable, or the legality of a defense raised.”  (Smith, supra, 
38 Hastings L.J. at p. 1042.)  
In California, “general choice-of-law rules have been 
formulated by courts through judicial decisions rendered under 
the common law, rather than by the legislature through 
statutory enactments.”  (McCann v. Foster Wheeler LLC (2010) 
CHEN v. LOS ANGELES TRUCK CENTERS, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Chin, J. 
 
7 
48 Cal.4th 68, 83 (McCann) [collecting cases].)  As the forum 
state, California will apply its own law “unless a party litigant 
timely invokes the law of a foreign state.”  (Hurtado v. Superior 
Court (1974) 11 Cal.3d 574, 581; see Reich, supra, 67 Cal.2d at 
p. 553.)   
To determine which jurisdiction’s law will govern, a trial 
court applies the governmental interest test, which sets out a 
three-step inquiry:  “First, the court determines whether the 
relevant law of each of the potentially affected jurisdictions with 
regard to the particular issue in question is the same or 
different.  Second, if there is a difference, the court examines 
each jurisdiction’s interest in the application of its own law 
under the circumstances of the particular case to determine 
whether a true conflict exists.  Third, if the court finds that there 
is a true conflict, it carefully evaluates and compares the nature 
and strength of the interest of each jurisdiction in the 
application of its own law ‘to determine which state’s interest 
would be more impaired if its policy were subordinated to the 
policy of the other state’ [citation], and then ultimately applies 
‘the law of the state whose interest would be the more impaired 
if its law were not applied.’ ” (Kearney v. Salomon Smith Barney, 
Inc. (2006) 39 Cal.4th 95, 107-108 (Kearney) [applying court’s 
“seminal” decision in Reich]; see Offshore Rental Co. v. 
Continental Oil Co. (1978) 22 Cal.3d 157.) 
In this case, the correctness of Judge Kendig’s initial 
choice of law ruling is not at issue.  The Court of Appeal 
expressly declined to address the propriety of that ruling, and 
we do so as well.  The question is limited to whether the trial 
court should have reconsidered its initial ruling after a 
defendant settled out of the case.  In other words, was there any 
CHEN v. LOS ANGELES TRUCK CENTERS, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Chin, J. 
 
8 
legal or factual basis that compelled the trial court to revisit the 
choice of law ruling?     
Although we have found no case in this or any other 
jurisdiction specifically addressing whether a choice of law 
ruling should be revisited under these circumstances, defendant 
Buswest maintains that Reich is instructive and precludes any 
consideration of the parties’ subsequent settlement.  Reich 
cautioned that “if the choice of law were made to turn on events 
happening after the accident, forum shopping would be 
encouraged.”  (Reich, supra, 67 Cal.2d at p. 555, italics added.)  
Plaintiffs, however, counter that Reich was referring to the 
underlying facts of the accident itself and not what plaintiffs 
refer to as “litigation facts,” that is, events that occur during the 
litigation like a party’s dismissal from the case.  Unlike facts 
underlying the accident itself, litigation facts like the requisite 
parties and potential claims are not yet known, and therefore 
cannot be fixed at the time of the accident. 
We agree with plaintiffs that Reich focused not on 
identifying the pertinent parties in the action, but on the parties’ 
true domicile as it related to the measure of damages.  (Reich, 
supra, 67 Cal.2d at pp. 555-556.)  Plaintiffs’ argument, however, 
goes further than simply distinguishing Reich.  They suggest 
that the trial court was required to revisit the prior ruling that 
Indiana law governed after the only Indiana defendant settled 
out of the case.   
In support of their position, plaintiffs focus on the Court of 
Appeal’s decision, which likened a motion to determine the 
choice of law to a motion in limine.  (See State Farm Mutual 
Automobile Ins. Co. v. Superior Court (2004) 121 Cal.App.4th 
490, 502 [motion is “the equivalent of an in limine motion that 
CHEN v. LOS ANGELES TRUCK CENTERS, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Chin, J. 
 
9 
seeks to resolve a conflict of laws or choice of law issue”].)  
Emphasizing that Judge Kendig’s choice of law ruling was only 
tentative, plaintiffs argue their settlement with Starcraft 
fundamentally changed the “calculus” of the governmental 
interests, requiring a new determination on the choice of law.  
While we do not opine on whether courts may reconsider choice 
of law rulings, and if so, under what circumstances, we conclude 
that the trial court was not required to do so here.   
 
In applying the governmental interest test, Judge Kendig 
provided an extended analysis of the interests at stake.  At the 
time she ruled that Indiana law governed the case, the operative 
two-year statute of limitations (Code Civ. Proc., § 335.1) on 
plaintiffs’ claims had already run.  Plaintiffs had also settled 
with the bus driver and tour bus company a year earlier.  (See 
ante, at p. 3.)  As the case headed towards trial, plaintiffs focused 
on their strict products liability claim, i.e., that the tour bus was 
defective without seatbelts and that the manufacturer, who 
designed and manufactured the bus, along with the distributor, 
who ordered the bus without seatbelts, were liable.  Plaintiffs 
did not contend that interested or indispensable parties to the 
litigation were not yet joined, or that the January 2014 choice of 
law ruling was otherwise premature.   
   
Rather, plaintiffs’ unwavering criticism throughout this 
case has been that Judge Kendig failed to give proper weight to 
California’s interest when she first ruled that Indiana law 
governed.  After Starcraft’s exit, it is certainly understandable 
(if not predictable) that the issue of California’s interest would 
again come to the fore.  However,  plaintiffs fail to persuade us 
that their decision to accept Starcraft’s settlement offer, in and 
of itself, required the trial court to revisit its ruling.  After 
plaintiffs sued both Starcraft and Buswest as joint tortfeasors, 
CHEN v. LOS ANGELES TRUCK CENTERS, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Chin, J. 
 
10 
plaintiffs later chose whether and when to settle with the 
Indiana-based manufacturer.  That is not to say we consider the 
settlement (which Judge Kendig found was made in good faith), 
along with plaintiffs’ subsequent dismissal of Starcraft, to be 
part of a strategy to revisit the choice of law issue.  Rather, we 
simply observe that because plaintiffs were fully aware of the 
settlement, they are hard-pressed to argue any unfairness due 
to any consequence arising from the settlement.  (See Denton v. 
City and County of San Francisco (2017) 16 Cal.App.5th 779, 
793-794 [good cause for continuing summary judgment hearing 
where settlement was unexpectedly set aside days before 
hearing].)    
 
Further, 
practical 
concerns 
underlying 
a 
court’s 
management of a trial militate against revisiting the choice of 
law ruling under these circumstances.  As discussed earlier (see 
ante, at p. 7), the governmental interest test is far from a 
mechanical or rote application of various factors.  (See Kearney, 
supra, 39 Cal.4th at pp. 107-108, 110 [recognizing “distinct state 
interests that may underlie separate aspects of the issue”]; 
McCann, supra, 48 Cal.4th at p. 97 [explaining difficulty of 
balancing conflicting interests of individual states that “ ‘ “are 
empowered to mold their policies as they wish” ’ ”].)  
 
Moreover, a trial court’s ruling on the governing law is 
often just the start to substantively resolving the case.  After the 
court determines the choice of law, factfinders must then “try 
the facts necessary to determine liability in accordance with 
such choice.”  (Beech Aircraft Corp. v. Superior Court (1976) 61 
Cal.App.3d 501, 517 [wrongful death action].)  The importance 
of deciding the choice of law first, moreover, is manifest in class 
actions.  (See Washington Mutual Bank, FA v. Superior Court 
(2001) 24 Cal.4th 906, 915 [“choice-of-law determination is of 
CHEN v. LOS ANGELES TRUCK CENTERS, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Chin, J. 
 
11 
central importance” to class certification issues].)  A “trial court 
cannot reach an informed decision on predominance and 
manageability without first determining whether class claims 
will require adjudication under the laws of other jurisdictions 
and then evaluating the resulting complexity where those laws 
must be applied.”  (Id. at p. 927.)   
 
In short, given the importance of determining the choice 
of law early on in a case — to enable trial courts to manage 
proceedings in an orderly and efficient fashion — we conclude 
that circumstances in which trial courts are required to revisit 
a choice of law determination, if any, should be the exception 
and not the rule.  On that note, we underscore that we do not 
reach the question whether trial courts may revisit a prior 
choice of law ruling.  Nor do we opine that there are no 
circumstances under which the trial court would be obligated to 
reconsider the choice of law.  We hold only that, in this case, 
plaintiffs fail to demonstrate that their decision to accept a 
settlement offer from one defendant constitutes such an 
exceptional circumstance.  
CONCLUSION 
Based on the foregoing, we reverse the Court of Appeal’s 
judgment and remand for further proceedings consistent with 
this opinion.  
CHIN, J. 
We Concur: 
CANTIL-SAKAUYE, C. J. 
CORRIGAN, J. 
LIU, J. 
CUÉLLAR, J. 
KRUGER, J. 
GROBAN, J.
 
 
See next page for addresses and telephone numbers for counsel who argued in Supreme Court. 
 
Name of Opinion Chen v. L.A. Truck Centers, LLC 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Unpublished Opinion 
Original Appeal 
Original Proceeding 
Review Granted XXX 7 Cal.App.5th 757 
Rehearing Granted 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Opinion No. S240245 
Date Filed: July 22, 2019 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Court: Superior 
County: Los Angeles 
Judge: J. Stephen Czuleger and Holly E. Kendig 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Counsel: 
 
Law Offices of Martin N. Buchanan, Martin N. Buchanan; Girardi & Keese and David R. Lira for Plaintiffs 
and Appellants. 
 
Shook, Hardy & Bacon, Frank C. Rothrock, Douglas W. Robinson, Janet L. Hickson and Kevin Underhill 
for Defendant and Respondent. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Counsel who argued in Supreme Court (not intended for publication with opinion): 
 
Martin N. Buchanan 
Law Offices of Martin N. Buchanan 
655 West Broadway, Suite 1700 
San Diego, CA  92101 
(619) 238-2426 
 
Kevin Underhill 
Shook, Hardy & Bacon 
5 Park Plaza, Suite 1600 
Irvine, CA  92614-2546 
(949) 475-1500