California Appellate Tracker

Plaintiff sued Disney for common law misappropriation of his story idea in making its animated file Zootopia.  This decision affirms a summary judgment for Disney.  Plaintiff had no direct evidence of copying.  It did not produce evidence sufficient to allow a reasonable inference of copying either.  The allegedly copied elements of plaintiff's story idea were not so unique as to… Read More

The trial court erred in granting the defendant gun shop summary adjudication of plaintiff gun shot victim's negligence per se claim based on sale of the gun to an 18-year-old who did not possess a valid, unexpired hunting license.  See Pen. Code 27510.)  Though "valid, unexpired" was ambiguous as to whether it included a valid license before its effective date,… Read More

Perfect 10 Inc. v. Amazon.com, Inc. (9th Cir. 2007) 508 F.3d 1146 remains good law and applies to all types of websites.  It holds that "embedded" images on a website do not infringe a copyright in the embedded image because the embedding process merely provides instructions to the web browser to go to another website to download the image.  The… Read More

By registering a derivative work, an author registers all of the material included in the derivative work, including that which previously appeared in an unregistered, original work created by the author.  So plaintiff's registration of Chart B which included the elements of Chart A sufficed to obtain a copyright on the elements of Chart A.  Moreover, the author of an… Read More

When a plaintiff has brought a PAGA action comprising individual (i.e., violations affecting the plaintiffs) and non-individual (violations affecting only other employees) claims, an order compelling arbitration of the individual claims does not strip the plaintiff of standing as an aggrieved employee to litigate the non-individual claims on behalf of other employees under PAGA. Read More

This decision affirms a $7 million judgment, including $6 million in punitive damages, against an employer for firing plaintiff in violation of Lab. Code 1102.5(c) (which prohibits adverse employment action in retaliation for a refusal to work reasonably perceived to violate a local, state or federal rule or regulation) and 232.5 (which prohibits retaliation for reporting working coinditions).  Plaintiff was… Read More

Following Walls v. Wells Fargo Bank (9th Cir. 2002) 276 F.3d 502 and distinguishing Manikan v. Peters & Freedman, LLP (9th Cir. 2020) 981 F.3d 712, this decision holds that a debtor may not bring an FDCPA claim based on the assertion that the debt that is being collected was discharged in bankruptcy.  The sole remedy for collection efforts barred… Read More

This decision holds that separate acts in the course of a collection action may constitute independent violations of the FDCPA and that the FDCPA's one-year limitations period runs separately from each of those violations.  To constitute a separate violation, the litigation conduct must be the last opportunity for the debt collector to comply with the FDCPA and must occur on… Read More

Anaheim's living wage ordinance applies to any business that receives a city subsidy--that is, a right to receive a rebate of any city tax.  This decision holds that defendant is such a business because it had a right to receive a rebate of certain city taxes if they exceeded the amount needed to repay bonds issued to revitalize the Anaheim… Read More

Medicare Subpart C's express preemption provision supersedes any state law or regulation applicable to Subpart C medical plans.  The provisions is intentionally broad in scope and was amended to apply to any state law or regulation, including common law and statutes not specifically directed at regulating medical plans. Read More

Plaintiff filed a 1983 action against a police officer claiming that he had violated his federal civil rights by killing a man who was a father figure to him.  On the defendant's motion, the district court dismissed the action finding that the plaintiff lacked Article III standing because plaintiff did not allege any not allege amy custodial, biological, or legal… Read More

Fire insurance policies must be written on the statutory form that includes a one-year from inception of loss (semi-contractual) statute of limitations.  This decision holds that the insured cannot circumvent that limitations provision by bringing suit under the UCL for an injunction against denial of insurance coverage under similar circumstances.  To have standing to sue under the UCL, the plaintiff… Read More

Disagreeing with Muller v. Fresno Community Hospital & Medical Center (2009) 172 Cal.App.4th 887, this decision holds that the California Supreme Court has not abandoned its requirement that for an order to be appealable under the collateral order doctrine, the order must direct payment of money or performance of an act.  That requirement remains a restriction on collateral order appeals… Read More

Lab. Code 2802 requires an employer to reimburse employees for expenses they incurred in working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic.  It does not matter that the state's emergency stay-at-home caused the employees to work from home rather than in an office.  Lab. Code 2802 contains no causation requirement or excuse.  Rather the section requires an employer to reimburse employees… Read More

While the Rowland factors' foreseeability factors weigh in favor of imposing a duty of care on employers to take safety measures to prevent employees from contracting COVID-19 and transmitting the disease to family members and others, the public policy factors weigh against finding such a duty of care and they outweigh the foreseeability factors.  Recognizing liability would create staggering risk… Read More

A wife's claim against her husband's employer alleging that she contracted COVID-19 when her husband brought it home from work is not preempted by the Workers Compensation Act because the claim does not depend upon proof that the husband employee was injured or got sick. While it may be necessary to prove the husband was ill with COVID to prove… Read More

Herbal sued defendant for Lanham Act violations, an intentional tort.  Accordingly, the court applied the Calder effects test to determine whether Arizona could assert personal jurisdiction over the defendant.  Defendants purposefully directed their tortious activities toward Arizona by selling to Arizona residents on an interactive website.  The alleged harm arose from those sales, among others.  And Herbal's pre-suit cease-and-desist letters… Read More

Applying Ixchel Pharma, LLC v. Biogen, Inc. (2020) 9 Cal. 5th 1130 to an at-will employment contract, this decision holds that to assert a tort claim for inducing breach of the contract, the plaintiff must allege independently wrongful conduct.  Here, plaintiff could not do so.  He lacked antitrust standing to rely on the antitrust violation that he had alleged as… Read More

Expanding on Asahi Kasei Pharma Corp. v. CoTherix, Inc. (2012) 204 Cal.App.4th 1, this decision holds that the Cartwright Act does not prohibit anti-competitive acts taken by merger partners in the run-up to the merger, even if the merger, though commenced in good faith, in the end falls through. Read More

To have standing to sue for an antitrust violation, the plaintiff must allege an injury arising from the aspect of the alleged antitrust violation that causes the evil at which the antitrust laws are aimed; namely, a reduction in competition.  Here, the alleged violation was a pre-merger agreement between the merging entities not to compete for each other's customers before… Read More