California Appellate Tracker

Health and Safety Code section 1430(b) allows a resident or patient of a nursing home to sue the facility for breach of any rights guaranteed by the Patients' Bill of Rights Act and for violation of regulations not relating to health and safety.  It allows up to $500 in damages, plus attorney fees and costs.  This opinion holds that the… Read More

The Medical Device Act did not preempt a state law duty to warn products liability claim with respect to an intervenous blood filter.  The FDA had reclassified IVC blood filters as Class II devices that were subject to three requirements applicable to all IVC blood filters.  Since the MDA preempts only state laws adding to or changing FDA requirements for… Read More

Generally, an order denying summary judgment is not reviewable on an appeal from a judgment entered after trial.  Ortiz v. Jordan  (2011) 562 U.S. 180, 184-185.  However, at least in the Ninth Circuit, the Court of Appeals may review an order denying summary judgment on a post-trial appeal if the denial was based on a purely legal issue, such as… Read More

A doctor who was joined a hosptial's staff and was given clinical privileges and performed surgery at the hospital was an independent contractor, not an employee and so could not state a Title VII claim for discrimination in employment against the hospital.  He was on call with the hospital only 5 days a month, and his earnings from the hospital… Read More

Plaintiff invested in a "forked" cryptocurrency which he kept in his Coinbase "wallet."  Coinbase refused to allow plaintiff to access the forked currency because it thought the network using that currency was unsafe.  This decision affirms a summary judgment for Coinbase.  On plaintiff's breach of contract claim, it holds that Coinbase's user agreement contained no provision requiring Coinbase to help… Read More

Citing Arias v. Superior Court (2009) 46 Cal.4th 969, this decision holds that the settlement and judgment in a prior class action and PAGA suit against the employer alleging the same meal and rest break violations is res judicata of plaintiff's similar PAGA claims.  Even though plaintiff opted out of the class action portion of the earlier case, he could… Read More

Summary judgment for defendant in an age and racial association FEHA discrimination case is affirmed.  The employer provided evidence of a non-discriminatory reason for firing plaintiff.  Plaintiff failed to introduce evidence raising a triable issue of fact that the stated reason was pretextual.  The few alleged comments about plaintiff's age--mostly that she looked much younger than her age--were harmless and… Read More

Amazon can be held liable on a strict products liability theory for physical injuries caused by products sold through Amazon's website.  Here, plaintiff was injured when a battery he had bought from Amazon (which had been stored in and was shipped from an Amazon warehouse) exploded.  Amazon was pivotal in bringing the battery to the customer, standing in between the… Read More

This decision outlines the seven factors a trial court should consider in deciding a third party's motion to quash a subpoena served on it by a criminal defendant.  Most important of those factors, particularly when the subpoena seeks social media posts, are the defendant's proof of a plausible justification for needing the subpoenaed documents and the consideration of privacy and… Read More

A private citizen group of taxpayers had taxpayer standing under CCP 526a to sue the District Attorney seeking an injunction to stop his office's confidential informant program, the principal aim of which was to secure confessions from criminal defendants in violation of their constitutional rights.  The suit was brought by taxpayers to enjoin waste of public funds on an illegal… Read More

Reversing the district court's judgment and permanent injunction, this decision finds that Qualcomm's patent licensing practices do not violate the Sherman Act.  The district court erred in finding anticompetitive harm from the effect Qualcomm's licensing practices had on cell phone manufacturersp--a market in which Qualcomm did not compete--rather than on rival chip manufacturers with which Qualcomm did compete.  Qualcomm's practice… Read More

Under the “sudden emergency” or “imminent peril” doctrine, “a person who, without negligence on his part, is suddenly and unexpectedly confronted with peril, arising from either the actual presence, or the appearance, of imminent danger to himself or to others, is not expected nor required to use the same judgment and prudence that is required of him in the exercise… Read More

James and Diane were temporary conservators of Elizabeth's person, but not of her estate.  When they had Elizabeth admitted to defendant's old folks home, James and Diane signed an arbitration agreement on Elizabeth's behalf.  This deision holds that the arbittration agreement was unenforceable against James and Diane sinnce they didn't sign in their individual capacity and unenforceable against Elizabeth because… Read More

The trial court wrongly granted a health insurer summary judgment on the insured's bad faith and UCL claims.  The insured's son was autistic and, before he turned 7 was given 157 hours a month of insured treatments.  When he turned 7, Magellan reduced the monthly allotment to 57 hours.  On the insured's appeal to the Department of Managed Health Care,… Read More

Johnson Sr. was the responsible managing agent for Johnson & Sons.  When he died, the younger Johnson didn't immediately substitute himself in as the company's RMO, so its license was automatically suspended for a period during which it completed work on the defendant's product. Held, since a single contract covered all of Johnson's work on the project, it couldn't recover… Read More

A landlord was not liable for the wrongful death of a hair dresser whose employer, a tenant in the property, had stored flammable hair treatment liquid on the premises, which ignited and incinerated the hair dresser/  The landlord had no actual or constructive knowledge that the employer was storing inflammable liquids on the premises and had no duty to investigate… Read More

Professional football players failed to allege a viable negligence claim against the NFL on a theory of negligence per se in distributing prescription pain killers and other drugs to enable injured players to continue competing.  The complaint did not allege facts showing that the NFL directly or indirectly supplied players with drugs or coordinated activities of clubs to do so,… Read More

Sammina Corp. gave two memos generated by its in-house attorneys to DLA Piper for the purpose of obtaining DLA Piper's valuation report which Sammina submitted to the IRS in support of its taking a worthless stock deduction in its income tax return.  The DLA Piper report mentioned and was based in part on the two memos.  Although district courts in… Read More

Shloss was Cohen's attorney in a disability discrimination suit Cohen brought against Golden State when one of its delivery drivers parked in a disabled persons parking spot to make a delivery.  Cohen claimed the delivery truck kept him from parking the disabled spot and thus blocked his access to nearby business A.  At trial, Cohen had no evidence to show… Read More

Under the continuing violations doctrine, an employer is liable for actions that took place outside the limitations period if these actions are sufficiently linked to unlawful conduct that occurred within the limitations period.  Here, Blue Fountain subjected the plaintiff to a continuous course of sexual harassment for more than a decade.  When plaintiff finally quit or was terminated, she sued. … Read More