Skip to Content (Press Enter)

Skip to Nav (Press Enter)

California Appellate Tracker

The following summaries are of recent published decisions of the California appellate courts, the Ninth Circuit, and the United States Supreme Court. The summaries are presented without regard to whether Severson & Werson represented a party in the case.

Subscribe to California Appellate Tracker

Thank you for your desire to subscribe to Severson & Werson’s Appellate Tracker Weblog. In order to subscribe, you must provide a valid name and e-mail address. This too will be retained on our server. When you push the “subscribe button”, we will send an electronic mail to the address that you provided asking you to confirm your subscription to our Weblog. By pushing the “subscribe button”, you represent and warrant that you are over the age of 18 years old, are the owner/authorized user of that e-mail address, and are entitled to receive e-mails at that address. Our weblog will retain your name and e-mail address on its server, or the server of its web host. However, we won’t share any of this information with anyone except the Firm’s employees and contractors, except under certain extraordinary circumstances described on our Privacy Policy and (About The Consumer Finance Blog/About the Appellate Tracker Weblog) Page. NOTICE AND AGREEMENT REGARDING E-MAILS AND CALLS/TEXT MESSAGES TO LAND-LINE AND WIRELESS TELEPHONES: By providing your contact information and confirming your subscription in response to the initial e-mail that we send you, you agree to receive e-mail messages from Severson & Werson from time-to-time and understand and agree that such messages are or may be sent by means of automated dialing technology. If you have your email forwarded to other electronic media, including text messages and cellular telephone by way of VoIP, internet, social media, or otherwise, you agree to receive my messages in that way. This may result in charges to you. Your agreement and consent also extend to any other agents, affiliates, or entities to whom our communications are forwarded. You agree that you will notify Severson & Werson in writing if you revoke this agreement and that your revocation will not be effective until you notify Severson & Werson in writing. You understand and agree that you will afford Severson & Werson a reasonable time to unsubscribe you from the website, that the ability to do so depends on Severson & Werson’s press of business and access to the weblog, and that you may still receive one or more emails or communications from weblog until we are able to unsubscribe you.

Interpreting Oregon law, the Ninth Circuit holds that a business interruption insurance policy that covered only losses due to direct physical loss or damage did not cover income lost due to COVID-19 government closure orders.  To fall within the policy's coverage, the loss must be due to a physical alteration of the property, which plaintiff didn't and couldn't allege. Read More

A statement of compliance with a demand for production of documents does not need to identify which documents relate to specific items of the demand.  Instead, a general statement that the party will produce the requested documents suffices.  (CCP 2031.210.)  However, under CCP 2031.280(a), as recently amended, when the documents are produced, the producing party must  identify to which specific… Read More

A private university must comply with the common law doctrine of fair procedure by providing accused students with notice of the charges and a meaningful opportunity to be heard, but the university is not required to provide accused students the opportunity to directly or indirectly cross-examine the accuser and other witnesses at a live hearing with the accused student in… Read More

The trial court erred in denying defendant's motion for relief from default based on CCP 473(b)'s attorney error provision.  The motion for relief was filed within six months after entry of judgment and was accompanied by an attorney declaration of fault.  It was in proper form, or at least substantially complied with the form requirements.  A motion for relief must… Read More

Evid. Code 1106 prohibits admission of specific instances of plaintiff's sexual conduct to prove the plaintiff's consent or lack of injury from alleged sexual harassment, assault or battery.  A "plaintiff's sexual conduct" includes involuntary as well as voluntary sexual conduct (such as a subsequent sexual assault by a different perpetrator). While evidence of sexual conduct otherwise excludable under 1106(a) may,… Read More

A health insurance company's verification of benefits (i.e., confirmation that the patient is insured, covered, and eligible for coverage) is not an enforceable oral promise to pay for the patient's treatment by a health care provider.  Here, summary judgment was properly granted against a health care provider's breach of oral and implied contract claims.  It produced no evidence to show… Read More

A 2022 amendment to CCP 340.16(b)(3) revives until 2026 claims for damage resulting from sexual assault that occurred after 2008.  This decision holds that the amendment revives any claim for damages arising from a sexual assault, without regard to the legal theory of the claim, and is not limited to tort claims for sexual assault or battery.  However, it questions… Read More

While a district court may convert a motion to dismiss into a summary judgment motion in the parties submit evidence in support of the motion, FRCP 12(d), the district court cannot sua sponte convert a summary judgment motion into a motion to dismiss.  Here, defendant didn't move to dismiss for lack of lack of Article III standing but raised the… Read More

Although acknowledging the issue still remains open, it decides the review the trial court's rulings on evidentiary objections on a summary judgment motion under the abuse of discretion standard which it claims is the majority position both before and after Reid v. Google, Inc. (2010) 50 Cal.4th 512 (which highlighted but did not decide the issue). Read More

This en banc decision holds that there is no implied right of action arising directly from 42 USC 1981.  Instead, the substantive rights which section 1981 confers are enforced through an action under 42 USC 1983.  Federation ofAfrican American Contractors v. City of Oakland  (9th Cir. 1996) 96 F.3d 1204, which held to the contrary is overruled. Read More

When a defendant files an Anti-SLAPP motion, he must identify which portions of the complaint he wishes to strike and show that those portions of the complaint allege conduct that is protected under CCP 425.16(e).  If the defendant moves to strike the whole complaint without identifying smaller portions of the complaint, the court may deny the motion if it finds… Read More

The district court did not err in denying defendant's motion to compel arbitration of plaintiff's claim that defendant discriminated against her in denying her a consolidation loan to combine her two existing student loans.  Defendant was judicially estopped from relying on the arbitration clause in the second loan because at an earlier hearing on whether that clause was unconscionable, defendant… Read More

Under Wage Order No. 5, a hospital may obtain an affirmative defense to a claim for overtime pay by securing a 2/3ds affirmative vote of the workers in the unit to an alternative work schedule so long as the employer first makes full disclosure of the effects that the alternative work schedule will have and fulfills various other procedural requirements. … Read More

Under Veh. Code 3066, the dealer bears the burden of proof on all elements of its protest against a manufacturer's notice that it intends to establish a new franchise within ten miles of the protesting dealer's location.  This statute is more specific than and prevails over Veh. Code 11713.13 which states that the manufacturer bears the burden of establishing the… Read More

The district court erred in holding that the delegation clause in the arbitration agreement in this case was unconscionable and therefore unenforceable.  The district court so ruled because the arbitration agreement also provided that if, for any reason, the dispute was not arbitrated, the parties waived a jury trial.  Such a pre-dispute waiver of jury trial is unenforceable under California… Read More

Following Rittmann v. Amazon.com, Inc. (9th Cir. 2020) 971 F.3d 904, this decision holds that drivers who drove goods from in-state warehouses to Domino's franchisees in California are workers engaged in interstate commerce within the meaning of the exception to the FAA's scope.  These drivers handled the last stage of transportation of the goods from out-of-state sources to the California… Read More

The parties stipulated to appointing a retired judge as a temporary judge to hear portions of their marital dissolution proceedings.  The order appointing the temporary judge stated that the appointment would end on April 1, 2020 except as to any requests for orders that had been submitted before that date but had not yet been resolved.  Here, wife submitted a… Read More

1 24 25 26 27 28 185