California Appellate Tracker

Annoyance and discomfort damages for trespass by defendant’s setting a wildfire that burned plaintiff’s home can include compensation for plaintiff’s emotional distress even though plaintiff was not present at the fire and suffered no physical injury.  Read More

Substantial evidence supported the findings that defendant trustees did not breach their fiduciary duties by failing to tell plaintiff about her subtrust and that plaintiff suffered no damage from her asserted ignorance of the subtrust.  Read More

The Civil Code’s treble damage multiplier for trespass or other tortious injury to trees applies to damages awarded for annoyance and discomfort as well as compensation for the actual injury to the trees Read More

Plaintiff had standing to sue under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, but not the UCL for unwanted text messages soliciting him to renew a gym membership, but the claims were properly dismissed because plaintiff expressly consented to receive the messages by giving his phone number to the gym, and merely allowing his gym membership to lapse did not revoke that… Read More

A materials supplier may be held liable under Civil Code 895 for defects in newly built residences only if (a) the supplier is strictly liable in tort, or (b) the supplier contributed to the defects by its own negligent act or omission or breach of contract.  Read More

District court abused its discretion by approving a class action settlement which provided no actual benefit to class members in exchange for release of their FDCPA claims.  Read More

Employee raised genuine issues of material fact as to racial discrimination and retaliation after he introduced evidence that his supervisor demeaned him with belittling, racist remarks and that he was fired after he complained about it.  Read More

Governmental immunity shielded the owner of the adjacent golf course, which had granted a trail easement to the government, from claims by a plaintiff who was injured by an errant golf ball while hiking on the trail.  Read More

The dismissal of a borrower’s fourth foreclosure delay lawsuit is affirmed based on res judicata and a lack of merit in the borrower’s securitization arguments.  Read More

The California Insurance Commissioner did not exceed his powers in promulgating regulations governing an insurer’s communicating an estimate of replacement costs to an insured.  Read More

A garnishment proceeding against a third party not involved in the original state court proceeding is a separate action which the garnishee can remove to federal court, and after removal, the action is governed by the federal rules of procedure, not state garnishment procedure.  Read More

Prospective employer violated the Fair Credit Reporting Act by including a release of claims in the same document as the statutorily required notice that it might obtain a credit report on the applicant for employment purposes.  Read More

General legislation covers Indian tribes unless they are expressly excluded, so the Dodd-Frank Act is interpreted to regulate for-profit consumer lending enterprises of Indian tribes.  Read More

Since California law treats silence as non-acceptance of a contract offer, a consumer did not agree to arbitrate disputes with Samsung by failing to respond to an arbitration clause that was included in a warranty and product information booklet packaged with a Galaxy cellphone which the customer received after signing a Verizon subscription agreement.  Read More

So long as the notice of intention to move for a new trial is timely filed, the trial court may, in its discretion, consider late-filed affidavits supporting the motion. Read More

Disclosure of defendant company’s president's misdeeds did not render the company’s previous touting of its ethics code an actionable misrepresentation or omission under Rule 10b-5, since ethics codes are inherently aspirational, not an actual depiction of corporate practice.  Read More

After an Indiana-based bus manufacturer was dismissed from the case, California law governed Chinese bus passengers’ claims against a California-based bus distributor for injuries sustained when the bus overturned in Arizona; only California had a governmental interest in application of its law.  Read More

Defendant’s Anti-SLAPP motion was properly denied when he was sued for secretly tape recording, and later publishing, a conversation that took place over dinner at a restaurant with plaintiff’s president, because even though this was protected activity, plaintiff showed a probability of success on its claims for, among other things, invasion of privacy.  Read More

For purposes of the five-year deadline for bringing a civil case to trial, trial “commences” when a jury is impaneled and sworn—even if the voir dire is not concluded within the five-year period.  Read More

The sue-and-be-sued provision in Fannie Mae's statutory charter does not confer federal jurisdiction over suits against Fannie Mae or allow it to remove those suits to federal court absent some other basis for federal jurisdiction.  Read More