California Appellate Tracker

Under section 16(b) of the Securities Exchange Act, a securities issuer may recover from a director or officer short swing profits made from purchase and sale of the issuer's securities within a six month period.  However, under 17 CFR 240.16b-3(d)(1), transactions between an issuer and its directors or officers are exempted if approved by the issuer's board of directors.  This… Read More

A motion for relief from default and default judgment under CCP 473(b)'s mandatory attorney fault provision must be brought within six months (and a motion under the section's discretionary provision must be brought diligently and in no case more than six months).  This decision holds that "six months" means either six calendar months or 182 days, whichever is longer.  Though… Read More

There is no private right of action to enforce Financial Code sections 22100 and 22751 which require licensure of consumer finance lenders.  The statute provides only for administrative enforcement, and unlike the statute interpreted in Goehring v. Chapman Univ. (2004) 121 Cal.App.4th 353 does not require any refund be made to a borrower, instead providing for forfeiture of fees and… Read More

Plaintiffs obtained a loan from defendant while it was an illegally unlicensed lender in California.  This decision holds that plaintiffs lack standing to sue defendant for violating the UCL in making the loan while unlicensed since plaintiffs suffered no loss of money or property due to the defendant's unlicensed status.  They received the exact loan terms for which they had… Read More

Pub. Util. Code 1759 barred this suit to hold PG&E liable for its public safety power shutoffs in 2019 based on the theory that the shutoffs were caused by PG&E's negligence in prior decades in maintaining its power grid, leaving it susceptible to causing wildfires that the power shutoffs were designed to prevent.  The PUC had been regulating both power… Read More

The Government Claims Statute (Gov. Code 905) requires plaintiffs to file a government claim with the prospective government entity defendant before filing a suit for damages.  However, the statute does not apply to actions for injunctive, specific, or declaratory relief--even if the declaration might be used in a later suit for damages.  Here, a contractor sued for a declaration regarding… Read More

The district court correctly dismissed plaintiff app developer's antitrust complaint against Apple for monopolizing the market for iPhone apps and rejecting plaintiff's apps.  The complaint failed to adequately identify the product market that Apple allegedly monopolized or restrained. Read More

The trial court correctly denied Mattson's motion to compel arbitration of Applied's suit against it for violation of the Uniform Trade Secrets Act. Mattson had hired Lai away from Applied.  Lai's employment agreement with Applied contained an arbitration clause.  Mattson was not a party to that contract and could not enforce it on a equitable estoppel basis since Applied's claim… Read More

A choreographer stated actionable claims for direct and contributory infringement of his copyrighted choreographic work by defendant's virtual animation as part of a video game.  The complaint alleged a plausible similarity between his work's selection and arrangement of choreographic elements--body position, body shape, body actions, transitions, use of space, timing, pauses, energy, canon, motif, contrast, and repetition--and defendant's virtual animation.… Read More

A defendant may raise unpleaded affirmative defenses in opposition to the plaintiff's summary judgment motion so long as the plaintiff is given adequate notice and an opportunity to respond.  See Cruey v. Gannett Co. (1998) 64 Cal.App.4th 356, 367; Wang v. Nibbelink (2016) 4 Cal.App.5th 1, 11.  The court may consider unpleaded affirmative defenses, if the complaint alleges facts supporting… Read More

Following Law Finance Group, LLC v. Key (2023) 14 Cal.5th 932, this decision holds that the 100-day limit on petitioning to vacate a Mandatory Attorney Fee Arbitration award is subject to equitable estoppel and equitable tolling.  It also holds that unless there is already an action pending between the parties, the petition must be served in same manner as a… Read More

Since its infancy, California has adopted English common law including the common law's rule refusing to allow courts to enforce gambling debts.  This decision holds that the same rule still bars suits on gambling debts from proceeding in California courts even though the state has legalized certain types of gambling.  The policy prohibiting judicial enforcement of gambling debts is independent… Read More

A trial judge may apply a negative (or less that 1) multiplier to a prevailing party's attorney fee lodestar for pervasive incivility of the party's attorney throughout the proceedings.  Incivility shows lack of skill, which is a permissible multiplier factor. Here, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in reducing the prevailing plaintiff's lodestar by 40% for that reason. Read More

The city was not liable for plaintiff's son's death in a shooting in a city park.  There was no dangerous physical condition of the park.  The city had no duty to provide guard services or security cameras, particularly as there had been only two prior killings in the park during the previous 23 years. Read More

Water Code 13330(b) requires any appeal from a regional board's decision to be filed within 30 days and expressly prohibits judicial review except in accord with section 13330.  This decision holds that an untimely filed appeal from the regional board's decision must be dismissed even if the appellant claims the regional board lacked subject matter jurisdiction when it rendered its… Read More

The trial court correctly denied defendant's Anti-SLAPP motion.  This Brown Act suit targeted the City Council's taking action on an item that was not posted in an agenda at least 72 hours before the City Council meeting in violation of Gov. Code, § 54954.2(a)(1).  While what was said at the City Council meeting may have been protected speech, the Council's… Read More

The district court erred in remanded this suit to state court after defendant removed it under 28 USC 1442, the federal officer removal statute.  To invoke federal jurisdiction under that section, the defendant must show (a) it is a “person” within the meaning of the statute; (b) there is a causal nexus between its actions, taken pursuant to a federal… Read More

The district court did not abuse its discretion in denying defendant attorney fees under the EAJA.  Though the district court disbelieved the government's expert witness, whose testimony was the principal evidence on which the government based its claim that defendant had overvalued the company he sold to an ESOP, the government did not anticipate that result when it went to… Read More

Ford removed this action to federal court under CAFA, then successfully moved to dismiss it under Rule 12(b)(6) because the plaintiff did not allege he had suffered an injury to his business, his person, or his reputation as required by the Washington privacy statute under which he sued.  On appeal, plaintiff argued that the lack of injury showed he did… Read More

Plaintiff wandered drunk into a parking garage owned by defendant and engaged in "horseplay," ending up sitting on a 43 inch tall perimeter wall on an upper story of the garage, from which she fell to the ground, severely injuring herself.  Plaintiff claimed that the defendant had hired a security service to, among other things, find and stop horseplay, as… Read More