A forum selection clause in defendant corporation's Delaware by-laws selecting the Delaware Chancery Court as the forum for any shareholder disputes was unenforceable in California state court because there is no right to a jury trial in Delaware Chancery Court so the forum selection clause operated as a pre-suit waiver of the constitutional right to a jury trial which cannot… Read More
Michael Jackson's corporations owed a duty of care to protect minors from Jackson's sexual predation even though the corporations were wholly owned and controlled by Jackson. A corporation that facilitates the sexual abuse of children by one of its employees is not excused from an affirmative duty to protect those children merely because it is solely owned by the perpetrator… Read More
Attempts to control, regulate, and monitor a spouse’s finances, economic resources, movements, and access to communications constitute abuse for which a domestic violence restraining order may properly be issued under the Domestic Violence Prevention Act. Read More
Agreeing with Montemayor v. Ford Motor Co. (2023) 92 Cal.App.5th 958 and other recent cases refusing to follow Felisilda v. FCA US LLC (2020) 53 Cal.App.5th 486, this decision holds that a standard California car sale contract with an arbitration clause does not require the car buyer to arbitrate his warranty claims or Song Beverly Act claims against the car's… Read More
The trial court erred in granting homeowners an injunction against the county Road Commissioner barring the county from enforcing ordinances banning encroachments on a county road leading to a popular public hiking trail. Courts may not enjoin enforcement of the laws, which in this case make encroachments a misdemeanor offense. Contrary to the homeowners' claim, CEQA does not require any… Read More
The complaint in this case properly alleged claims under the Insurance Fraud Protection Action (Ins. Code 1871 et seq.) and UCL. It alleged that a unlicensed defendant, Mir, set up a supposed medical management firm that did not just manage the radiology labs, but referred patients at his discretion to them, directed what tests should be performed and by whom. … Read More
The FDA requires protein quantity, calculated in an FDA approved method, to be shown on the Nutritional Facts Panel of food items. And the label must also indicate if the protein is of lower quality or adjust the displayed protein content to adjust for the lower quality. Here, defendant's products displayed the correct protein content as shown by an FDA-approved… Read More
A party may appeal from denial of its summary judgment motion by stipulating to entry of judgment after and based on the denial of the summary judgment motion and making clear that it is doing so only for the purpose of appealing the denial of summary judgment--because there was no full record developed at trial that could be said to… Read More
Equitable tolling could apply to a plaintiff's pursuit of an action in a foreign court to prevent destruction of evidence needed for proof of plaintiff's substantive claim eventually brought in state court. It is not necesssary for equitable tolling that the prior suit seek substantive relief that lessens the plaintiff's injury or damage. The plaintiff need only show notice to… Read More
A dismissal without prejudice in either state or federal court is not a final judgment given res judicata effect if the dismissal is entered after a demurrer has been sustained or motion to dismiss has been granted with leave to amend and the dismissal is filed within the time allowed for amendment. Read More
Disagreeing with Torres v. Adventist Health System/West (2022) 77 Cal.App.5th 500 and Naranjo v. Doctors Medical Center of Modesto, Inc. (2023) 90 Cal.App.5th 1193, this decision holds that a plaintiff cannot state an actionable UCL or CLRA claim based on emergency room management fees charged by hospitals if the hospital complies with state law in posting its fee schedule on… Read More
Since 2010, the public disclosure bar to a False Claims Act qui tam action (31 USC 3730) has applied to bar Federal False Claims Act suits only if (1) the disclosure at issue occurred through one of the channels specified in the statute; (2) the disclosure was public; and (3) the relator’s action is substantially the same as the allegation… Read More
When a debtor voluntarily converts a bankruptcy from Chapter 13 to Chapter 7, any appreciation in the value of the debtor's assets during the period between the filing of the original Chapter 13 petition and the date of conversion to Chapter 7 is property that belongs to the Chapter 7 estate, not the bankrupt debtor. Read More
A federal court can may compel a witness to appear at a trial if the court is within the same state or within 100 miles of the witness' residence or place of business. FrCP 45. The court may take remote testimony for good cause in compelling circumstances. FRCP 43. But the court cannot compel a witness outside the normal subpoena… Read More
The UCL’s standing requirements are satisfied when an organization, in furtherance of a bona fide, preexisting mission, incurs costs to respond to perceived unfair competition that threatens that mission, so long as those expenditures are independent of costs incurred in UCL litigation or preparations for such litigation. When an organization has incurred such expenditures, it has “suffered injury in fact”… Read More
Defendant's "Nature Fusion" products featured those words on the front label along with a picture of an avocado on a leaf. This decision holds that the label was not false advertising because it was ambiguous and the back label clarified the product's actual contents so that no reasonable consumer who examined both front and back would think that the product… Read More
Liapes, a 46-year-old woman, alleged an actionable claim under the Unruh Civil Rights Act (Civ. Code 51.5, 51) for intentionally discriminating on the basis of gender and age in targeting (and allowing advertisers to target) their ads to particular audiences of Facebook users based on chosen characteristics, including age and gender. She claimed that as a result of the ad… Read More
Acknowledging that both issues have generated a split of authority and are now before the Supreme Court for its review, this decision holds that (1) direct physical loss or damage to property, rather than mere loss of the property’s use, is a prerequisite for coverage under normal business interruption insurance policies, and (2) the ephemeral existence of COVID-19 or its… Read More
This decision holds that the Anti-SLAPP motion in this case was properly denied because the suit fits within CCP 425.17(b)'s exception for suits in the public interest. The plaintiff did not seek any relief greater than or different from the relief sought for the general public or a class of which the plaintiff was a member. Seeking individualized relief, such… Read More
Following prior 9th Circuit precedent, this decision holds that an order denying an Anti-SLAPP motion to dismiss is immediately appealable under the collateral order doctrine--unless the order denies the motion because the claim fits within one of CP 425.17's exceptions to the Anti-SLAPP statute--but in concurrences two of the panel's three judges urge the full court to overrule the prior… Read More
