California Appellate Tracker

Plaintiff tripped over the rear wheel of a Bird electric scooter that the user had parked with its rear wheel protruding into a public sidewalk.  The City of Los Angeles was not liable for failing to enforce conditions of its license which allowed Bird to operate in the city since the city exercised discretion in determining whether to enforce the… Read More

This decision holds that a restaurant established that its business losses incurred due to government closure orders during the COVID-19 pandemic were within the basic coverage of its business interruption coverage but also fell within the virus exclusion and the exclusion for loss caused directly or indirectly by enforcement of an ordinance or law.  Hence, judgment for the insurer is… Read More

Vehicle Code 27001 prohibits honking a car horn except when reasonably necessary to warn of a safety hazard.  Plaintiff was ticketed for honking her horn in a show of support for demonstrators protesting outside a government official's office.  Over a strong dissent, this decision holds that section 27001 is a content-neutral restriction on speech (to the extent a car horn… Read More

Postal Instant Press, Inc. v. Kaswa Corp. (2008) 162 Cal.App.4th 1510 rejected outside third party reverse piercing of the corporate veil to make the corporation liable for one of the shareholder's personal debts out of concern for the corporation's other shareholders and creditors.  This case was distinguishable as it involved a suit by one member of an LLC against the… Read More

In a case involving mixed legal and equitable claims, it is usual to try the equitable claims first to the court.  The court's findings on those equitable claims are binding on the jury when it decides the legal claims even if the court's findings are not necessary to its judgment on the equitable claims. Read More

In what started out as an attorney's attempt to collect $3,500 in fees from a client, the attorney got tagged with a $334,400 fee award to the client after losing in the mandatory fee arbitration proceeding and then not demanding a new trial within the allotted time.  B&P Code 6203 and 6204 provide for one-sided fee awards in an effort… Read More

Disagreeing with 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 against the car's manufacturer.  A warranty claim is not based on the car sale contract, but instead is an obligation of the manufacturer that… Read More

Plaintiff suffers from PTSD.  He sought to have his wife present at his deposition as an accommodation because she calms him alleviating some PTSD symptoms.  Defendants opposed arguing that the wife was a percipient witness to the medical procedures that were the subject matter of the suit and allowing her to sit in on her husband's deposition would allow her… Read More

Under CCP 1281.9(a)(2), a neutral arbitrator must make disclosures to the parties to an arbitration as required by the Ethics Standards for Neutral Arbitrators in Contractual Arbitration.  Here, the arbitrator did so, and also disclosed that he would accept employment in other disputes as an arbitrator without informing the parties.  In a non-consumer arbitration, the arbitrator is allowed to make… Read More

A government agency cannot be held liable for inverse condemnation by reason of erosion caused by inadequate storm drainage facilities unless the agency owns those facilities.  Here, as a condition of approving subdivision maps, defendant county required the developers of two subdivisions along a creek to build storm drainage facilities in the creek adjoining the subdivisions.  The county also required… Read More

The no voluntary payment clause in plaintiffs' insurance policies barred its recovery for costs it incurred in complying with a settlement agreement and consent order with the government to remediate mercury contamination of water supplies.  Plaintiff had notified defendant of its receiving a notice of the federal government's claim for natural resources damages from the contamination, but then failed to… Read More

This case denies American Pipe tolling of the statute of limitations on claims for statutory penalties under the Investigative Consumer Reporting Agencies Act (Civ. Code 1786.50).  The act clearly states that statutory penalties cannot be recovered in a class action, so that affected consumers could not reasonably rely on the pendency of a prior class action to protect their right… Read More

First Student Cases (2018) 5 Cal.5th 1026 is to be given retroactive effect so that pre-2018 violations of the Investigative Consumer Reporting Agencies Act are actionable despite the conflict among Court of Appeal opinions before First Students over whether the Act was constitutional. Read More

A trial court must consider a party's ability to pay before ordering that party to pay all or a portion of the fees of an expert appointed by the court under Evid. Code 730 or Fam. Code 3111 or 3112. Read More

Under Fam. Code 6342(a)(1), a trial court may award "restitution be paid to the petitioner for loss of earnings and out-of-pocket expenses, including, but not limited to, expenses for medical care and temporary housing, incurred as a direct result of the abuse inflicted by the respondent in a Domestic Violence Prevention Act proceeding.  This decision holds that "restitution" in this… Read More

Most time deadline statutes and rules are now construed as non-jurisdictional unless Congress has clearly stated otherwise.  The 12-year statute of limitations on quiet title actions against the United States (28 U.S.C. §2409a(g)) is a claims processing rule, not a jurisdictional statute.  The time limit appears in a section separate from the Quiet Title Act's jurisdictional provision and does not… Read More

Appeal of an order interpreting a nonprofit corporation's by-laws governing annual election of its directors was not moot though several elections occurred after the suit was filed because the judgment had a continuing effect on the corporation's elections and was subject to repetition but evading review. Read More

Plaintiff homeowners association is a nonprofit corporation.  It held a recall election at which a majority of the votes cast, but not a majority of eligible votes, were in favor of the recall.  The corporation's articles required a majority of eligible voters to recall board members, but that provision is invalidated by Corp. Code 5034, 7222(a)(2), 7151(e), allowing a majority… Read More

Gov. Code 855.4 grants public entities and employees immunity from liability for injuries caused by discretionary decisions about protecting public health.  This decision follows s Wright v. City of Los Angeles (2001) 93 Cal.App.4th 683 and City of Los Angeles v. Superior Court (2021) 62 Cal.App.5th 129 in holding that this provision is not governed by the same requirements as… Read More

A 2018 amendment to CCP 340.1 further relaxed the statute of limitations on childhood sexual assault claims, but it removed the words "on the merits" from the portion of the statute that used to state that it did not apply to any claim that had been litigated to finality on the merits before 2003.  The deletion of that language was… Read More