On a discretionary appeal from a class certification order under Fed. R. Civ. P. 23(f), the Court of Appeal has jurisdiction to review any issue bound up with the decision to certify the class. Thus, in this case, on a 23(f) appeal from an order certifying two nationwide TCPA classes, the Court of Appeal had jurisdiction to consider whether the… Read More
An appeal automatically stays a mandatory injunction, but not a prohibitory injunction. Here, the trial court ordered the San Bernardino Board of Supervisors to remove and replace one of its sitting members based on the trial court's finding that the board had violated the Brown Act (Gov. Code 54950) requiring open meetings. A mandatory injunction is one that commands a… Read More
Straumann, a Swiss company, and its Swiss-resident officer, Hemm, established purposeful contacts with California by entering into an agreement to be the exclusive distributor outside the United States for Rodo, a California company making dental products. Hemm was a member of Rodo's board at the time, but negotiated the exclusive distributorship as Straumann's agent. Rodo's shareholders sued claiming that Rodo's… Read More
The D'Amico v. Board of Medical Examiners (1974) 11 Cal.3d 1 doctrine about summary judgment affidavits not being allowed to contradict admissions in discovery is not a doctrine regarding the admissibility of evidence, but rather whether the contradictory evidence can be given an weight. Here, an expert changed his answer on the key question of whether a plaintiff was exposed… Read More
Hom entered into a lease with tenant. The lease granted extensive rights to lenders to tenant, including performing tenant's obligations and assuming its rights under the lease. Tenant sued Hom who cross-complained against tenant and Petrou, a lender to tenant. As part of his settlement with tenant, Hom dismissed his cross-complaint against Petrou as well. Petrou was awarded attorney fees… Read More
The district court correctly denied plaintiff's motion for a preliminary injunction before compelling arbitration of the plaintiff's wage-and-hour misclassification claims. Plaintiff had sought an injunction requiring Uber to reclassify all its drivers as employees rather than independent contractors. That injunction would have changed, not preserved, the status quo pending arbitration. Also, there was no urgent need for an injunction before… Read More
Google settled part of a class action, paying some class members $65 million and agreeing to separately pay plaintiffs' attorneys fees as awarded by the court. Plaintiffs' attorneys appealed from the district court's fee award, claiming the district court should have awarded them more based on the common fund theory of fee awards rather than the lower sum it calculated… Read More
The trial court properly denied plaintiff prejudgment interest as the basis for computation of its damages was disputed. It sought to hold defendants jointly and severally liable for defense costs in an underlying lawsuit. It recovered much smaller several damages limited to costs of defending against claims arising from each defendant's own work. Read More
A subcontractor that agrees to indemnify the developer for claims arising from the subcontractor's own work is not jointly and severally liable for defense costs that cannot be specifically attributed to claims against particular subcontractors, such as status conferences and the like. Read More
Disagreeing with Pulte Home Corp. v. CBR Electric, Inc. (2020) 50 Cal.App.5th 216, this decision holds that while an insurer's right to proceed on its insured's claim under the doctrine of equitable subrogation is an equitable claim as to which there is no right to a jury trial, if the claim to which the insurer successfully becomes subrogated is a… Read More
Noting the split of authorities on this issue, this decision follows Cooksey v. Alexakis (2004) 123 Cal.App.4th 246 in holding that a party who seeks a continuance under section 437c(h), must show why the discovery necessary to oppose the motion for summary judgment or summary adjudication could not have been completed sooner, and accordingly requires the court to grant the… Read More
Following Ankenbrandt v. Richards (1992) 112 S.Ct. 2206, this decision states that the domestic relations exception to federal diversity jurisdiction is narrow, applying only to claims that seek issuance or modification of a divorce, alimony or child custody decree. However, this case fell within that narrow exception. Ex-wife's complaint alleged that ex-husband had concealed his interest in a corporation so… Read More
After the Court of Appeal decided in Hollingsworth v. Superior Court (2019) 37 Cal.App.5th 927 that the trial court, having first acquired jurisdiction, should decide whether the Workers Compensation Appeals Board had exclusive jurisdiction over this worker's injury suit--a question that turned on whether the employer had workers compensation insurance coverage at the time plaintiff was injured. The plaintiff had… Read More
It is misconduct for counsel to argue to the jury that there is no evidence on an issue when he knows that such evidence exists but was excluded at his request. Here counsel exacerbated that misconduct by telling the jury that the court's admonition to ignore the arresting officer's statement about defendnat's intoxication showed the testimony was nothing but a… Read More
In an FEHA case, a prevailing defendant is entitled to ordinary court costs, as well as attorney fees, only in the trial court's discretion which must be exercised under the Christiansburg standard, allowing a fee or cost award to the defendant only when the plaintiff's suit is found to be objectively meritless, frivolous or without foundation. That standard applies to… Read More
The statute of limitations on a claim of quid pro quo sexual harassment starts running only when the employee knows or reasonably should know of the employer's decision not to promote him or her. Any period of time during which the employer's decision is not disclosed or otherwise made known to the employee does not count against the limitations period. Read More
A temporary judge to whom the parties to this divorce proceeding had stipulated violated his ethical duties by failing to promptly disclose to wife that he had been employed, after first being appointed to this case, as a neutral in two new cases in which husband's lawyer was an attorney for one of the parties. Under the Code of Judicial… Read More
Following Kim v. Reins Internat. California, Inc. (2020) 9 Cal.5th 73, this decision holds that the fact that the plaintiff's individual claim is time-barred does not prevent him from bringing a PAGA action to collect civil penalties as to the employer's Labor Code violations as to other employees within the limitations period. Lab. Code 2699(c) requires only that the plaintiff… Read More
Like several other decisions, this one concludes that later U.S. Supreme Court opinions have not overruled or cast doubt on Iskanian v. CLS Transportation Los Angeles, LLC (2014) 59 Cal.4th 348. It remains true that an employer cannot compel an employee to arbitrate a PAGA claim and that the FAA does not preempt that rule. Read More
Under Parker Drilling Management Services, Ltd. v. Newton (2019) 139 S.Ct. 1881, state law supplements federal law governing matters on the outer continental shelf only to the extent that there is a gap in federal law. If federal law already addresses the issue, it excludes state law. This decision holds that the FLSA addresses the issue of meal and rest… Read More
