Court Opinion

ID: 9840972
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-20 20:04:58.365071+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:38:37.319614
License: Public Domain

Filed 9/20/23 Flores v. Medicali Holdings CA2/3
   NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS

California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on
opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule
8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for
purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

                      SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT

                                  DIVISION THREE

 GABRIEL FLORES,                                                     B317695

          Plaintiff and Respondent,                                  (Los Angeles County
                                                                     Super. Ct. No. 19STCV31058)
          v.

 MEDICALI HOLDINGS, INC.,

          Defendant and Appellant.

     APPEAL from an order of the Superior Court of
Los Angeles County, Armen Tamzarian, Judge. Affirmed.
     Stern & Goldberg, Alan N. Goldberg, and Peter Tran for
Defendant and Appellant.
     No appearance for Plaintiff and Respondent.

                          ‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗
      During discovery in this matter, defendant Medicali
Holdings, Inc. (Medicali)1 served requests for admission on
plaintiff Gabriel Flores seeking his admission that most of his
wage-and-hour claims were barred by the applicable statutes of
limitations. Flores denied the requests, and Medicali prevailed
on this issue at trial. After trial, Medicali sought attorney fees
under Code of Civil Procedure section 2033.420,2 which allows a
court to award reasonable expenses, including attorney fees,
incurred by a party to prove “the truth of any matter” that
another party has failed to admit when asked to do so. The trial
court denied the motion, concluding that the fees Medicali sought
to recover were incurred to defend against the untimely claims on
the merits—not to establish that the claims were time-barred—
thus they were not recoverable under the plain language of the
statute.
      As we discuss more fully below, the trial court did not
abuse its discretion by denying Medicali’s motion for attorney
fees. We therefore affirm.

1     Flores named as defendants Medicali Holdings, Inc., a
California corporation (Medicali CA); Medicali, Inc., a Nevada
corporation (Medicali NV); and Medicali’s principal, Charles
Weinberger. As described below, judgment was entered as to all
three defendants, but only Medicali CA has appealed. In this
opinion, we will refer to all the Medicali defendants
interchangeably as “Medicali.”

2     All subsequent undesignated statutory references are to
the Code of Civil Procedure.

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        FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
I.     Background.
       Flores was employed by Medicali as a glassblower from
about 2011 until September 9, 2016. Nearly three years later, on
August 30, 2019, Flores filed the present action alleging a variety
of wage and hour claims: failure to pay wages (first cause of
action), failure to pay minimum wages (second cause of action),
failure to pay overtime (third cause of action), failure to provide
meal and rest breaks (fourth cause of action), unfair competition
(fifth cause of action), waiting time penalties (sixth cause of
action), and cancellation of contract (seventh cause of action).
       The case was tried to the court in 2021. In a statement of
decision, the trial court found that the first, second, third, fourth,
and sixth causes of action were governed by a three-year statute
of limitations; the fifth cause of action was governed by a four-
year statute of limitations; and the statutes were not tolled by
Medicali’s principal’s travel outside the state. Accordingly, Flores
could not recover under his first through fourth and sixth causes
of action for any alleged violations that occurred before August
30, 2016, and he could not recover under his fifth cause of action
for any violations that occurred before August 30, 2015. On the
merits, the court found that Medicali had not violated the
minimum wage laws, but at times had failed to pay Flores
overtime. The court thus found Flores was entitled to recover
$238.50 in damages for unpaid overtime and $6,065 in
restitution.
       On November 10, 2021, the court entered judgment for
Flores.

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II.    Medicali’s motion for attorney fees.
       A.     Medicali’s motion.
       After entry of judgment, Medicali moved for attorney fees
pursuant to section 2033.420. That section provides that if a
party unreasonably fails to admit the truth of any matter when
requested to do so, and if the party requesting the admission
thereafter proves the truth of that matter, the party requesting
the admission “may move the court for an order requiring the
party to whom the request was directed to pay the reasonable
expenses incurred in making that proof, including reasonable
attorney’s fees.” (§ 2033.420, subd. (a).)
       In support of its motion for attorney fees, Medicali asserted
that in September 2019, it served requests for admission that
asked Flores to admit the following:
       (1)    Requests for admission nos. 39, 40, 42, 43, 45, 46, 48,
49, 54, and 55 asked Flores to admit that the statute of
limitations precluded Flores from seeking damages pursuant to
the first, second, third, fourth, and sixth causes of action for any
period prior to August 30, 2016.
       (2)    Requests for admission nos. 51 and 52 asked Flores
to admit that the statute of limitations precluded Flores from
seeking damages pursuant to the fifth cause of action for any
period prior to August 30, 2015.
       Flores denied each of these requests in November 2019.
Following trial, however, the trial court concluded that the
substance of Medicali’s requests for admissions were correct as a
matter of law. Medicali thus contended that pursuant to section
2033.420, it was entitled to recover the following:
       (1)    3.0 hours of attorney time, billed at $1,500, for
“[e]fforts to meet and confer with Plaintiff to discontinue his

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attempts to seek damages for alleged unpaid wages outside of the
applicable statutory periods.”
      (2)     25 hours of attorney time, billed at $9,125, for
“[p]reparation of additional discovery and the filing of two (2)
motions to compel . . . related to Plaintiff’s . . . claim of damages
going back to 2012, as stated in his supplemental responses to
Special Interrogatories provided on March 27 and 30, 2020.”
      (3)     5.5 hours of attorney time, billed at $2,750, for
preparing for and taking Flores’s deposition concerning his
claims for unpaid wages “prior to 2015.”
      (4)     3.75 hours of attorney time, billed at $1,875, for
reviewing Flores’s payroll records from 2010 to 2014, and
preparing for and taking Flores’s deposition, about half of which
was directed to Flores’s time-barred claims.
      (5)     23.0 hours of attorney time, billed at $8,125, for
conducting legal research and preparing a trial defense “against
Plaintiff’s claim of alleged unpaid wages prior to the applicable
statutory periods, including Plaintiff’s belated claim that the
statute of limitations was tolled as to those claims.”
      (6)     6.0 hours of attorney time, billed at $3,000, for
addressing Flores’s attempts at trial “to present testimony and
introduce voluminous payroll records going as far back as 2011.
Defendants were required to defend against such claims and
Plaintiff’s claim that the statute of limitations was tolled.”
      B.      Flores’s opposition.
      Flores opposed the motion for fees. He urged that his
denial of the requests for admission was reasonable, and none of
the fees sought were incurred to prove that his claims were
barred by the applicable statutes of limitations. Instead, Flores
asserted, all of the fees sought were “costs for preparing [a]

                                  5
defense if the statute was actually extended.” Flores thus
contended that Medicali was not entitled to recover attorney fees
pursuant to section 2033.420.
      C.      Order denying attorney fees.
      The trial court denied the request for attorney fees. The
court found Flores’s denial of the requests for admission was
unreasonable, but concluded Medicali failed to establish that it
incurred attorney fees and costs to prove the facts Flores should
have admitted. The court explained: “The matters plaintiff
denied were that he could not recover on his first six causes of
action for unpaid wages before August 30, 2016 . . . . [¶] Those
matters are a simple ‘application of law to fact.’ (§ 2033.010.)
The law is that these causes of action have a three-year statute of
limitations. (§ 338(a); Pineda v. Bank of America, N.A. (2010) 50
Cal.4th 1389, 1398.) There are only two necessary facts. First,
plaintiff filed the complaint on August 30, 2019. This fact was
not disputed and could not reasonably be disputed. Second,
plaintiff’s employment with defendants ended on September 9,
2016. This fact was never disputed. Plaintiff’s initial complaint
alleges, ‘Plaintiff and Defendants separated on or around
September 9, 2016.’ ”
      “Defendant does not show it incurred the fees claimed in
proving this simple application of law to fact. Attempting to
convince plaintiff these matters were true does not constitute
proving them. All the other fees described were incurred
preparing for trial on the merits of plaintiff’s claims for unpaid
wages before August 30, 2016. That also does not constitute
proving the matters plaintiff should have admitted. Defendant
incurred those fees as a backup plan so it would be prepared in
case plaintiff was right and could recover those wages.”

                                 6
      Medicali timely appealed from the order denying the
request for attorney fees.3
                            DISCUSSION
      Medicali contends it was entitled to recover attorney fees
incurred to defend against Flores’s claims for wages prior to
August 30, 2016, because had Flores not denied the requests for
admission, “the scope of discovery and the length of Trial would
have been narrowed and shortened.” Medicali’s claim lacks
merit.
I.    Legal standards.
      A party to a civil action may propound a written request for
the admission of “the truth of specified matters of fact, opinion
relating to fact, or application of law to fact.” (§ 2033.010.) Any
matter admitted in response to a request for admission is
conclusively established against the party making the admission.
(§ 2033.410.) A request for admission may properly be used to
establish fact, opinion, or the application of law to fact. (Garcia v.
Hyster Co. (1994) 28 Cal.App.4th 724, 735 (Garcia).)
      If a party fails to admit the truth of any matter when
requested to do so, and if the party requesting that admission
thereafter proves the truth of that matter, “the party requesting
the admission may move the court for an order requiring the
party to whom the request was directed to pay the reasonable
expenses incurred in making that proof, including reasonable
attorney’s fees.” (§ 2033.420, subd. (a).) The court is required to
award the reasonable expenses incurred unless it finds that an

3      Flores separately appealed from the judgment, and the
court consolidated Flores’s and Medicali’s appeals. On January
5, 2023, we dismissed Flores’s appeal for failure to file an opening
brief.

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objection to the request was sustained, the party who denied the
request “had reasonable ground to believe [he or she] would
prevail on the matter,” the admission sought “was of no
substantial importance,” or “[t]here was other good reason for the
failure to admit.” (§ 2033.420, subd. (b)(1)–(4); see also Grace v.
Mansourian (2015) 240 Cal.App.4th 523, 529 (Grace) [quoting
statute].) The trial court’s determination of whether costs of
proof should be awarded normally is reviewed for an abuse of
discretion (Grace, at p. 529), but de novo review of such an order
is warranted “ ‘ “where the determination of whether the criteria
for an award of attorney fees and costs in this context have been
satisfied amounts to statutory construction and a question of
law.” ’ [Citation.]” (Serrano v. Stefan Merli Plastering Co., Inc.
(2011) 52 Cal.4th 1018, 1026.)
       The Court of Appeal considered the scope of attorney fees
recoverable under the predecessor to section 2033.420 (see Cal.
Law Revision Com. com., West’s Ann. Cal. Code Civ. Proc. (2023
ed.) foll. § 2033.420) in Garcia, supra, 28 Cal.App.4th 724. There,
plaintiff Garcia filed a complaint alleging that he was seriously
injured at work while operating machinery designed and
manufactured by defendant Hyster. The insurer who provided
workers’ compensation insurance to Garcia’s employer filed a
complaint in intervention against Hyster, alleging that it had
been required to pay plaintiff workers’ compensation benefits as
the result of Hyster’s negligence. (Id. at p. 728.) The complaint
in intervention went to trial, and the trial court granted a
nonsuit for Hyster. (Ibid.) Hyster then moved for an award of
attorney fees “ ‘associated with the trial of this case’ ” based on
the insurer’s denial of several requests for admission—namely,
that Garcia’s employer was negligent, that the employer’s

                                8
negligence was a legal cause of Garcia’s damages, and that the
employer’s negligence was responsible for at least 20 percent of
Garcia’s injuries. (Id. at pp. 728–729, 733–734.) The trial court
awarded Hyster all of the attorney fees sought, and the insurer
appealed. (Id. at p. 734.)
       The Court of Appeal reversed the award of attorney fees. It
explained that the statute authorizes only those expenses
“ ‘incurred in making that proof,’ i.e., proving the matters denied
by the opposing party.” (Garcia, supra, 28 Cal.App.4th at
pp. 736–737, italics added.) In the case before it, Hyster “likely
devoted at least some resources to preparation of proof that it
was not negligent in the design of its [machinery], and perhaps
toward a showing of operator negligence; however, these issues
were completely outside the scope of the request for admissions.”
(Id. at p. 737.) Nonetheless, “[n]othing in the bare-bones showing
made below, or in the lower court’s award, reflects that any
consideration was given to the fact that Hyster Company’s trial
preparation might extend beyond those areas covered in the
request for admissions.” (Ibid.) Thus, the court concluded, the
fee award was “far more than reasonable compensation under the
circumstances,” requiring a remand “for redetermination of costs
and fees.” (Id. at pp. 737–738.)
       The Court of Appeal came to a similar conclusion in Grace,
supra, 240 Cal.App.4th 523. There, the plaintiff was injured in a
vehicle collision with the defendant. The plaintiff sued, alleging
that the defendant caused the collision after running a red light.
The plaintiff served requests for admission, asking the defendant
to admit that he failed to stop at the red light, and that his
failure was negligent, was the actual and legal cause of the
accident, and was a substantial factor causing the accident and

                                 9
plaintiff’s damages. The plaintiff also asked the defendant to
admit that, as a result of the accident, the plaintiff was injured
and needed medical treatment, all treatment was necessary and
within the standard of care, and all medical bills were
reasonable. Finally, the plaintiff asked the defendant to admit
the plaintiff’s lost earnings as a result of the accident. The
defendant denied each of these requests. (Id. at p. 526.)
       A jury found the defendant was negligent and awarded the
plaintiff damages for medical expenses, lost earnings, and pain
and suffering. (Grace, supra, 240 Cal.App.4th at p. 528.) The
plaintiff then filed a motion for attorney fees pursuant to
section 2033.420. The trial court denied the motion, finding that
the defendant’s denial was reasonable. (Ibid.) The Court of
Appeal reversed, finding it was not reasonable for the defendant
to have denied that he ran a red light, that his conduct was
negligent, that his negligent conduct was the cause of the
accident, and that the plaintiff was injured in the accident. (Id.
at pp. 530, 533.) The court therefore held that the plaintiff was
entitled to recover the fees and costs associated with proving
these facts. The court noted, however, that the plaintiff was
required to segregate these amounts “from costs and fees
expended to prove other issues,” including issues to which the
defendant had stipulated. (Id. at pp. 529–530, italics added.)
Accordingly, because the defendant had stipulated to the
plaintiff’s medical bills and lost wages—and because the court
found it was reasonable for the defendant to have denied that the
plaintiff would require future medical care and would suffer
future lost wages as a result of the accident—the court remanded
for a determination of the fees the plaintiff was entitled to
recover. (Id. at pp. 533–534.)

                                10
II.    The trial court did not abuse its discretion by
       denying Medicali’s motion for attorney fees.
       As we have noted, if a party unreasonably fails to admit the
truth of a matter, section 2033.420 permits a trial court to award
fees and costs incurred “in making that proof”—that is, proof of
the fact or legal conclusion that the losing party was asked to, but
did not, admit. Consistent with this statutory language, the
cases discussed above hold that a prevailing party is entitled
under section 2033.420 to recover only the costs of proving the
matters that are the subject of the requests, not the costs of
proving “other issues.” (See also Association for Los Angeles
Deputy Sheriffs v. Macias (2021) 63 Cal.App.5th 1007, 1031.)
       Applying this standard here, we conclude that the trial
court did not abuse its discretion by denying Medicali’s motion for
attorney fees. The first category of fees Medicali sought related
to defense counsel’s efforts to persuade plaintiff “to discontinue
his attempts to seek damages for alleged unpaid wages outside of
the applicable statutory periods.” But as the trial court correctly
noted, although counsel’s efforts, if successful, would have made
establishing the statute of limitations defense unnecessary, those
efforts were not themselves directed toward “proving”—that is,
introducing evidence or making a legal argument to the court—
that significant portions of plaintiff’s claims were time-barred.
Accordingly, under the statute’s plain language, fees associated
with these efforts were not recoverable.
       The second category of fees were for discovery, trial
preparation, and trial related to “defending against Plaintiff’s
claim of alleged unpaid wages prior to the applicable statutory
periods.” Although these fees would not have been incurred had
plaintiff admitted the claims were time-barred, that was not the

                                11
question before the trial court. Instead, the only relevant
question was whether the fees were incurred to prove the matters
plaintiff should have admitted—i.e., that his claims that accrued
before August 30, 2016 (or August 30, 2015) were time-barred.
Medicali’s fees associated with defending these claims on the
merits unquestionably were not.
       There is only one element of Medicali’s fee request that
arguably had merit: fees incurred to “defend[ ] against Plaintiff’s
claim . . . that the statute of limitations was tolled.” To the
extent they were reasonably incurred, fees associated with
researching and briefing plaintiff’s tolling claim could be
recoverable under section 2033.420 as expenses incurred to prove
a matter plaintiff should have admitted. However, Medicali did
not separately account for any such fees as the statute requires.
(See Grace, supra, 240 Cal.App.4th at p. 529 [in seeking fees and
costs under section 2033.420, moving party must “segregate[ ]
[recoverable fees] from costs and fees expended to prove other
issues”].) Under these circumstances, the trial court did not
abuse its discretion by denying Medicali’s motion.
       Medicali asserts that it should have been awarded the
claimed fees because it “could not simply do nothing when faced
with the Plaintiff’s denials of the Requests and assume that the
admissions sought by the Requests (i.e., the time periods for each
of the causes of action as limited by the applicable statutes of
limitations) would have somehow been automatically applied at
Trial.” Perhaps not, but section 2033.420 permits a court to
award only those fees and costs incurred to prove facts that were
unreasonably denied, not all fees and costs incurred as a result of
the unreasonable denial. The trial court did not err in so
concluding.

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      Medicali suggests finally that the trial court erred by
concluding that “since the admissions sought by the Requests
were an ‘application of law to fact,’ the Requests were somehow
exempt from” section 2033.420. Not so. The trial court did not
suggest that Medicali’s requests for admission were “exempt”
from the statute; it simply concluded that Medicali had not
demonstrated that it had incurred any recoverable fees. As we
have discussed, that conclusion was not an abuse of discretion.

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                        DISPOSITION
      The order denying Medicali’s motion for attorney fees is
affirmed.

    NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL
REPORTS

                                          ADAMS, J.

We concur:

                  EDMON, P. J.

                  EGERTON, J.

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