Court Opinion

ID: 9792824
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 02:37:30.08152+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:36:36.930035
License: Public Domain

BAXTER, J.
I respectfully dissent. Convinced that the plain meaning of the statutory scheme before us can have unfair results, the majority find a nonexistent ambiguity in order to justify a construction they deem more equitable. Accordingly, they conclude that if the payor of personal injury damages dishonors a hospital’s perfected emergency-care lien when disbursing damage proceeds, thus forcing the hospital to a cumbersome and time-consuming lawsuit to collect any portion of its bill, the hospital may still recover from the payor an amount no greater than 50 percent of the original damage proceeds, even if the hospital’s legitimate costs for the victim’s emergency care, as claimed in its lien notice, far exceed that sum.
I cannot agree. In clear and unmistakable prose, Civil Code sections 3045.1 through 3045.5, as originally enacted in 1961,1 state as follows: A hospital may perfect an emergency-care lien against an injury victim’s damage recovery in excess of $100. This lien is “to the extent of the amount of the reasonable and necessary charges” for the care provided. (Former § 3045.1, as enacted by Stats. 1961, ch. 2080, § 1, p. 4340.) If the payor of damages discharges the lien directly from the damage proceeds themselves, the payor’s responsibility to the hospital is limited to “so much [of the amount of the claimed lien] as can be satisfied out of 50 percent of the moneys” to be disbursed. (Former § 3045.4, as enacted by Stats. 1961, ch. 2080, § 1, p. 4341.) However, if the payor fails to honor the lien at the time damages are disbursed, the payor “shall be liable,” in a lawsuit by the hospital, for the full “amount of [the claimed] lien . . . which the hospital was entitled to receive as payment” for the emergency care rendered to the victim. (Ibid.)
As almost every previous commentary on these statutes has observed, their language thus leaves no doubt that if the lien was dishonored in the *224disbursement of damages, the 50 percent limit no longer applies. This plain statutory meaning is neither implausible nor arbitrary. The Legislature could well have wished to discourage both negligent and intentional misappropriation of the hospital’s share. It could also have concluded that the hospital is entitled to extra consideration and incentive for the time, trouble, expense, and delay involved in suing for its bill after the lien remedy, which was designed to absolve the hospital of such difficulties in return for limits on its interest in the damage proceeds, has been dishonored.
On the other hand, the statutes do not remove all limits on the hospital’s recovery from a payor of tort damages who dishonored the hospital’s lien. In every case, the statutes measure the hospital’s entitlement against the payor by the “amount of [the hospital’s] lien,” which can never exceed the full amount of the damage proceeds against which the lien attached. Thus here, where an insurance carrier ignored an emergency care lien for medical costs of $49,197.95 when disbursing a $15,000 damage settlement, the carrier should be liable to the hospital not for $7,450, as the majority calculate, but for $14,900 (the amount of the damage recovery above $100).
This case invokes the most fundamental principle of statutory construction. “[O]ur primary task in construing a statute is to determine the Legislature’s intent. [Citation.] ‘The court turns first to the words themselves for the answer.’ [Citation.]” (Brown v. Kelly Broadcasting Co. (1989) 48 Cal.3d 711, 724 [257 Cal.Rptr. 708, 771 P.2d 406].) “When statutory language is . . . clear and unambiguous there is no need for construction, and courts should not indulge in it. [Citation.]” (Solberg v. Superior Court (1977) 19 Cal.3d 182, 198 [137 Cal.Rptr. 460, 561 P.2d 1148].) “[W]here the meaning of a statute is clear, courts ‘must follow the language used and give to it its plain meaning, whatever may be thought of the wisdom, expediency, or policy of the act . . . .’ ” (Woodmansee v. Lowery (1959) 167 Cal.App.2d 645, 652 [334 P.2d 991].)
I therefore examine the statutory language in detail. Former section 3045.1 provides that a hospital “which furnishes emergency medical or other services of a reasonable value in excess of one hundred dollars ... to any person injured by reason of an accident or wrongful act not covered by [the workers’ compensation statutes], shall, if the person asserts or maintains a claim against another for damages on account of his injuries, have a lien upon the damages in excess of one hundred dollars . . . recovered, or to be recovered ... to the extent of the amount of the [hospital’s] reasonable and necessary charges ... for the treatment, care, and maintenance of the person in the hospital during [an] emergency period” up to 72 hours. (Stats. *2251961, ch. 2080, § 1, p. 4340.) Under section 3045.2, “[t]he lien shall apply whether the damages are recovered, or are to be recovered, by judgment, settlement, or compromise.”
Former section 3045.3 describes the procedures for perfecting the lien. These require that, before any damages are disbursed to the injured person, the hospital deliver, either in person or by registered mail, a written notice of lien, stating the amount of emergency care expenses claimed, to all persons “known to the hospital and alleged to be liable” for the injury, and to the liability insurers of such persons. (Stats. 1961, ch. 2080, § 1, p. 4340.)
Former section 3045.4 sets forth the responsibilities and liabilities of a person who, after receiving notice of the hospital’s lien, makes “any payment to the injured person, or to his . . . representative[s], for the injuries he sustained.” (Stats. 1961, ch. 2080, § 1, p. 4341.) If the person making such a payment does so “without paying to the . . . hospital the amount of its lien claimed in the notice, or so much thereof as can be satisfied out of 50 percent of the moneys exceeding one hundred dollars . . . due” under a final judgment or settlement after the payment of prior liens, then the payor “shall be liable to the . . . hospital for the amount of its lien claimed in the notice which the hospital was entitled to receive as payment” for the emergency care provided to the victim. (Ibid., italics added.) Section 3045.5 provides that within one year after a payment to the injured person, the hospital may bring a legal action against the payor to enforce its lien.
Thus, the statute makes a clear distinction between what the hospital may receive directly from the damage proceeds, on the one hand, and what the payor owes the hospital if he fails to honor the lien when proceeds are disbursed, on the other. In the first case, the hospital may obtain the “amount of its lien claimed in the notice,” but only up to 50 percent of the total damage proceeds available after payment of prior liens. (Former § 3045.4.) In the latter case, the payor’s liability to the hospital is measured by exactly the same standard, i.e., “the amount of its lien claimed in the notice,” but without reference to the 50 percent limit. (Ibid.)
As the majority concede, since the inception of this statutory scheme, every commentary on its meaning, save one, has indicated that once the hospital’s lien has been overlooked in the initial disbursement of judgment or settlement proceeds to the injury victim, the 50 percent limit no longer applies. (63 Ops.Cal.Atty.Gen. 808, 813-814 (1980); Selected 1960-1961 California Legislation (1961) 36 State Bar J. 697, 698; but see 4 Witkin, Summary of Cal. Law (9th ed. 1987) Personal Property, § 193, p. 184.) We *226recently confirmed that assumption. (City and County of San Francisco v. Sweet (1995) 12 Cal.4th 105, 122, fn. 11 [48 Cal.Rptr.2d 42, 906 P.2d 1196].)
The majority reject this long-standing consensus. Concerned that the statute’s literal words would expose the payors of personal injury damages to unjust and disproportionate liability for the victim’s medical payments in excess of his actual damage recovery, the majority purport to find an ambiguity which allows a more “reasonable” construction.
The majority note that former section 3045.4 makes a payor who overlooks the hospital’s lien liable only for “the amount. . . which the hospital was entitled to receive as payment” for the victim’s emergency care. (Italics added.) The statute’s use of the past tense verb “was,” the majority reason, is most “reasonabl[y]” interpreted as referring back, not to the time services were rendered and costs incurred, but simply “to the amount the hospital was entitled to receive at the time the judgment or settlement was disbursed.” (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 220, italics added.) Thus, the majority conclude, if the disburser has mispaid proceeds which the hospital was entitled to receive in satisfaction of its lien, the payor simply remains liable to the hospital, from his own funds, for the mispaid amount, which cannot exceed 50 percent of the total proceeds previously disbursed.
This circular analysis is fatally flawed. In the first place, the majority’s interpretation disregards the relevant wording of the statutory scheme as a whole. As already indicated, former section 3045.1 establishes the hospital’s lien “to the extent of the amount” of its legitimate (i.e., “reasonable and necessary”) charges for the victim’s emergency care. Under former section 3045.4, if the lien is satisfied directly from the proceeds of a judgment or settlement in the victim’s favor, the hospital is entitled to receive “the amount of its lien claimed in the notice,” with the sole restriction that no more than 50 percent of the judgment or settlement proceeds shall be diverted from the victim to satisfy the lien.
On the other hand, if the lien is dishonored when such proceeds are disbursed, the payor is liable to the hospital for “the amount of its lien claimed in the notice which the hospital was entitled to receive as payment for the medical care and services rendered to the injured person.” (Former § 3045.4, italics added.) The majority ignore the italicized modifying words. When those words are considered, the phrase “was entitled to receive,” which the majority find crucial in former section 3045.4, appears clearly to refer to the full amount of medical costs for which the hospital became *227entitled to payment when it “[rendered] the medical care and services ... to the injured person.”
The majority err by concluding, in effect, that parallel phrases with obvious and material semantic differences must be interpreted as if they were identical. In the majority’s lexicon, the phrase “the amount of its lien claimed in the notice, or so much thereof as can be satisfied out of 50 percent of the moneys . . . due under [a] judgment ... or settlement” means exactly the same thing as “the amount of its lien claimed in the notice which the hospital was entitled to receive as payment for . . . care and services rendered.”
Such cannot be the case. The majority offer no reason, other than vague notions of equity, for concluding that it is.
If the Legislature’s purpose was that deduced by the majority, it could scarcely have chosen a more obscure and convoluted way to express its intent, though simpler alternatives were readily at hand. For example, the Legislature could easily have declared that if the payor of a judgment or settlement dishonors the hospital’s lien when disbursing such proceeds, the payor remains liable to the hospital for the amount mispaid.
But this is not what the statutes say. Instead, their words and design manifestly create two different standards of recovery by the hospital from the payor of a personal injury judgment or settlement, depending on whether the hospital’s lien is satisfied or dishonored when the proceeds of the judgment or settlement itself are disbursed.
Nor may we depart from this plain meaning on the premise that the literal import of the statutory scheme is arbitrary or implausible. There seems ample justification for the two-tiered system established by the statutes.
As the majority explain, a hospital is always entitled, in theory, to full recovery of its costs of an injury victim’s care. Apart from the statutes at issue here, the hospital may proceed at law directly against the patient for the entire amount of its reasonable and necessary charges. (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 217; Selected 1960-1961 California Legislation, supra, 36 State Bar J. at pp. 697, 699; see City and County of San Francisco v. Sweet, supra, 12 Cal.4th 105, 120.)
But such a suit entails significant costs and risks for both the hospital and the injured patient. Both must incur the delays and legal expenses necessary to resolve the suit. Until a judgment is won, if at all, the hospital has no *228specific claim against the victim’s assets, which he is free to dissipate. On the other hand, once the hospital’s suit prevails, whatever assets the victim does have, including any tort recovery he previously received, may be exposed to the full extent of the hospital’s judgment. Thus, when the hospital bill is high, the victim impecunious, and his recovery of tort damages modest, such a legal action could wipe out the victim’s damage recovery— even reduce him to poverty—while still providing no guarantee that the hospital will recover all, or even any, of its costs of the victim’s emergency care.
The statutory lien device offers a form of trade-off, which provides the hospital, the victim, and the payor of damages some limited protection in such cases. Without pursuing or obtaining a judgment against any person, the hospital may, by a simplified notification process, secure a right of recoupment directly from particular assets, i.e., the victim’s tort damage recovery in the hands of the payor. The hospital’s risk that no assets will be available for recoupment is thus significantly reduced. As justice might suggest, the direct source of available assets, and the person obligated to ensure satisfaction of the lien, is not the innocent victim, but the one already responsible in damages for the victim’s injury.
On the other hand, the hospital may recover, under this simplified and safer procedure, no more than half of such damage proceeds after payment of prior liens. Thus, the statutes assure the victim that, no matter how high his emergency hospital bill, the entire amount of his judgment or settlement will not be diverted to pay it. Where the payor honors the lien, the statutory scheme also guarantees that the payor’s total monetary responsibility will not exceed the amount for which he became obligated under the judgment or settlement. Sometimes the hospital will not get full reimbursement through this process. However, the lien statutes give the hospital an incentive to conclude in such cases that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, and that half a loaf is better than none.
Given these considerations, the Legislature could decide that negligence in implementing the nonjudicial lien remedy should be strongly discouraged. The Legislature could also seek to dissuade damage payors from colluding with injury victims to deprive hospitals of their rightful share of the damage proceeds.
Moreover, when a payor dishonors a hospital’s lien by misdistributing the hospital’s share of the liened proceeds, he disrupts the balance on which the lien remedy depends. Once the liened assets have thus passed from the *229payor’s hands, the lien itself is destroyed, and the hospital’s statutory security interest has evaporated. Moreover, unless someone will pay voluntarily, the hospital must now assume the effort, risk, cost, and delay of a legal action in order to recoup any portion of its bill.
The Legislature could well have determined that these increased risks and costs, caused entirely by the mistake of a person responsible for the victim’s damages, should be compensated by the hospital’s opportunity to collect from that person a portion of its bill exceeding the earlier maximum of 50 percent of the victim’s tort judgment or settlement. I find such a legislative choice understandable and unremarkable.
The majority’s fears that this reading of the statutes may expose the payor to disproportionate liability for the victim’s hospital bill are exaggerated. Correctly construed, the statutory scheme does not remove all relationship between the size of the victim’s damage recovery and the amount the hospital may recover from the payor.
While the statutes plainly remove the 50 percent limit when the hospital’s lien has been dishonored, they do contain some ambiguity about what measure of recovery then applies. In such a case, the payor is liable for “the amount of [the hospital’s] lien claimed in the notice which the hospital was entitled to receive as payment” for the medical services rendered. (Former § 3045.4.) Because the hospital’s lien was “to the extent” of its full legitimate charges (former § 3045.1), and because former section 3045.4 refers to the “amount . . . claimed in the notice which the hospital was entitled to receive” for services rendered, this formula could be interpreted to mean the hospital may recover, from a payor who dishonored its lien, the full amount of its bill, regardless of the amount the injury victim recovered from the payor.
However, an alternative construction seems more plausible. Under former section 3045.4, the hospital’s recovery is measured, and limited, by “the amount of [the hospital’s] lien” in the particular case. (Italics added.) “A lien is a charge imposed . . . upon specific property by which [such property] is made security for the performance of an act.” (§ 2872, italics added; see also Code Civ. Proc., § 1180.) Hence, while the amount secured by a lien may be unlimited, the lien itself grants no rights except in the specific property to which it attaches, and thus is never worth more than the value of the liened property.
Here, the lien in question is upon “the damages in excess of one hundred dollars . . . recovered, or to be recovered, by the [injured] person” or his *230representatives. (Former § 3045.1.) By referring specifically to the lien and its “amount,” not simply to the hospital’s charges or costs independent of any lien, the phrase “amount of its lien,” as used in former section 3045.4, most logically implies a limitation to the actual value of the lien, insofar as that value is insufficient to cover the hospital’s full expense.
The fact that the lien is “to the extent” of the full reasonable charges for emergency services rendered to an accident victim means simply that a hospital may theoretically obtain rights in the victim’s damage recovery up to that full amount. In other words, no statutory ceiling is imposed on the amount of reasonable charges which the lien may secure or the amount of damages against which it may attach. On the other hand, insofar as the damages won by the victim in a particular case are less than the hospital’s full reasonable charges, the value of the corresponding lien is limited by the amount of the actual damages to which it attaches. In practical effect, the “amount of [the] lien” is the value of the damage proceeds against which it applies, up to the full amount of the hospital’s charges.
Of course, once the payor has misdistributed the liened proceeds, the lien itself is extinguished. However, this does not alter the meaning of the term “amount of [the] lien” as that term should thereafter apply. This “amount,” independent of the specific assets to which it formerly related, persists as the measure of recovery even after the lien itself no longer exists.
Thus where, as here, the hospital’s bill exceeds the damage proceeds payable to the victim, the hospital may receive no more than 50 percent of those proceeds when they are disbursed, as all agree. On the other hand, if the payor withholds such a disbursement from the hospital, he thereafter becomes liable for the full “amount of [the hospital’s] lien,” unlimited by the 50 percent formula. But because the hospital’s bill for the victim’s emergency care exceeds the total damage proceeds for which the payor was originally obligated, the “amount of [the] lien” is the lesser sum, i.e., the amount of the damage proceeds. This is the maximum recovery the hospital may obtain from the payor who dishonored its lien.
This construction reconciles the clear legislative purpose to provide a different formula for recovery after the hospital’s lien is dishonored, on the one hand, with the statutory use of the “lien amount” concept as the measure of the hospital’s maximum recovery, on the other. It also avoids the injustice which might arise in particular cases if a payor of minimal tort damages, having overlooked a hospital’s lien when disbursing such proceeds, thereby *231became liable for an unlimited amount of hospital charges far exceeding the damage payment itself.2
Here, as previously indicated, the amount claimed by Hospital for the emergency care of victim Schmidt exceeded $49,000, but the disbursable damages to which Hospital’s lien attached, and thus the actual value or “amount of its lien,” came only to $14,900 ($15,000 minus $100). Because defendant Farmers Insurance Group (Farmers) disregarded Hospital’s lien when disbursing the agreed amount of damages to Erik L. Schmidt, Farmers became liable to Hospital for the full “amount of [this] lien.” Hence, under former section 3045.4, Hospital is entitled to recover $14,900 from Farmers.
Accordingly, I would reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeal. The cause should be remanded to the Court of Appeal with directions to order the superior court to vacate its judgment and enter a new judgment for Hospital in the amount of $14,900.
Kennard, J., and Werdegar, J., concurred.

 All further unlabeled statutory references are to the Civil Code.

 The majority insist former section 3045.4 either allows a hospital whose lien was dishonored to recover its full charges (here $49,197.95), or limits the hospital in such a case to 50 percent of the damage proceeds over $100 (here $7,450), but cannot be reconciled with the third alternative I recommend—a recovery limited to the full amount of the damage proceeds above $100 (here $14,900). However, the language the majority cite undermines their “all or nothing” view, since it tethers the hospital’s recovery after its lien was dishonored to the “amount of [the] lien.” (Former § 3045.4, italics added.) The majority implicitly acknowledge the common law principle that the amount or value of a lien is limited to the value of the security to which it attaches. They suggest, however, that the Legislature is free to “define and limit” a statutory lien and has done so here. (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 222, citing Berry v. Hannigan (1992) 7 Cal.App.4th 587, 592 [9 Cal.Rptr.2d 213] [statute may compel release of auto tower’s lien upon payment of towing and impound charges by credit card].) But there is no indication the Legislature used the word “lien” in any other than its commonly understood sense.
Nor, contrary to the majority’s implication, would our adoption of my third alternative come as a surprise to the parties. Though both sides took “all or nothing” positions in their briefs, I raised the third alternative with both counsel at oral argument. Counsel for plaintiff Miercy Hospital and Medical Center (Hospital) conceded that my approach was a reasonable interpretation of former section 3045.4, though he had not previously considered it. Of course, this court is not limited in any event to a rigid choice between the precise statutory constructions offered by the parties themselves.