Justia California Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

CEH filed a complaint in Alameda County alleging violation of the California Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act, Health and Safety Code section 25249.5 (Proposition 65) by failing to warn individuals who live or work in the Kern County town of Shafter that a soil fumigant manufactured by Dow contains a chemical known to cause cancer. Dow moved to transfer the case to Kern County, where the cause of action arose, citing Code of Civil Procedure section 393(a). The trial court denied held that venue is proper in any county under section 395(a) because Dow is a nonresident defendant with no principal place of business in California. The court of appeal disagreed, concluding that section 393(a) establishes that proper venue is in Kern County, where the cause of action arose.The “main relief rule” does not apply because the complaint allegations do not implicate real property rights; it is not necessary to determine whether the relief sought is primarily local and governed by section 392. A Proposition 65 private enforcement action does not fit within the class of cases characterized as transitory because the plaintiff is not seeking recompense for personal harm. An action for equitable relief under such a statute falls within the express language of section 393(a) when, as here, the plaintiff seeks a statutory penalty. View "Dow Agrosciences LLC v. Superior Court" on Justia Law

Between 2000 and 2001, plaintiff-appellant Troy Flowers's application for a securities sales license was rejected by Ohio state officials because they found that he was "not of 'good business repute.'" In addition, Flowers was subjected to discipline by securities regulators with respect to his violation of securities laws and regulations and his failure to cooperate in a securities investigation. Flowers filed a complaint against the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, Inc. (FINRA), seeking an order that FINRA expunge his disciplinary history from its records. The trial court sustained without leave to amend FINRA's demurrer to Flowers's complaint. Because federal securities laws and regulations provided Flowers with a process by which he may challenge FINRA's publication of his disciplinary history, and Flowers has not pursued that process, the Court of Appeal concluded he may not now, by way of a civil action, seek that relief from the trial court. Accordingly, the Court affirmed the trial court's order sustaining the demurrer and its judgment in favor of FINRA. View "Flowers v. Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, Inc." on Justia Law

Tammy Fernandes successfully sued vexatious litigant Raj Singh and his wife Kiran Rawat individually and as trustees of the Sita Ram (or “Sitaram”) Trust, for wrongful eviction and related claims. She obtained an award of compensatory and punitive damages, as well as costs and attorney fees. All defendants filed a joint notice of appeal through counsel. While Rawat and the Trust remained represented by counsel on appeal, Singh represented himself. On appeal, Rawat claimed the trial court erred in denying her motion to vacate the judgment based on lack of service, and attacked the punitive damage award. Singh also challenged the punitive damage award, disputed service on Rawat, and contended the attorney fee award was excessive. Finding no merit in defendants’ claims, the Court of Appeal affirmed. View "Fernandes v. Singh" on Justia Law

Defendants-appellants the City of Huntington Beach and the City Council of Huntington Beach (collectively, City) appealed mandamus relief to plaintiffs-respondents The Kennedy Commission, William Adams and Jason Puloe (collectively, Kennedy) invalidating City’s amendment to the Beach Edinger Corridors Specific Plan (BECSP). Kennedy filed a complaint alleging in the first cause of action that the amended BECSP was inconsistent with the housing element in violation of California’s Housing Element Law (Gov. Code) sections 65454, 65580, 65583, 65587 and 65860. Kennedy argued that the amended BECSP was void as it was not consistent with the housing element in the general plan, and therefore the amendment should have been invalidated. City responded that it was amending its housing element and was seeking approval from the Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD). The trial court applied section 65454, which required a specific plan be consistent with the general plan, and declared the amended BECSP was void. The Court of Appeal granted City’s petition for writ of supersedeas staying the writ of mandate. City argued: (1) for the first time on appeal, the City of Huntington Beach was a charter city, making it exempt from a consistency requirement of its specific plans to the general plan pursuant to section 65700; (2) if City was subject to the consistency requirement, the trial court erred by invalidating the entire BECSP amendment because it contained provisions that did not refer to housing; (3) the trial court’s judgment and writ are overbroad and overreaching and therefore violated constitutional separation of powers; (4) the issues are not ripe for adjudication because Kennedy cannot show harm; and (5) Kennedy has no standing to bring a claim under section 65454. The Court of Appeal concluded Kennedy’s attempts to show City adopted the consistency requirement in section 65454 failed. Even if the exemption applied, the remedy would not be that the amended BECSP was void. Rather, according to section 65750, City should have been granted time to amend its housing element. “As noted, City had already submitted an amended housing element to the HCD for approval prior to the trial court’s decision in this case. Moreover, the trial court ruled that it would not grant relief on Kennedy’s claim that City must implement the housing element in its current state. It was without dispute that City was working with the HCD to have the housing element comply with state law. City was free to amend its housing element to comply with state law while leaving the amended BECSP in place.” The Court of Appeal reversed the superior court’s grant of a writ of mandate and remanded this matter for further proceedings. View "Kennedy Commission v. City of Huntington Beach" on Justia Law

Plaintiff Marla Hogue sought a restraining order under the Domestic Violence Prevention Act against her estranged husband, defendant Jerry Hogue, after moving back to California from Georgia. In April 2016, defendant made a special appearance through counsel to move to quash the action for lack of personal jurisdiction. The trial court granted the motion on April 27, 2016. Never having been served with notice of entry of the order, plaintiff timely filed her notice of appeal on October 21, 2016. Plaintiff contended California had jurisdiction over defendant because either his conduct came within the “special regulation” basis for specific jurisdiction, or otherwise justified specific jurisdiction as a continuing course of conduct commencing in California and thereafter directed toward California after defendant left the state. The Court of Appeal agreed with the former premise (which plaintiff conceded obviated the latter argument), and vacated the order quashing service. The Court remanded for consideration of the merits of her petition. View "Hogue v. Hogue" on Justia Law

Plaintiff Vitatech International, Inc. (Vitatech) filed a breach of contract lawsuit against defendants National Marketing, Inc., CortiSlim International, formerly known as National Marketing, Inc., CortiSlim International, LLC, and Alan Sporn (collectively, Defendants). On the eve of trial, the parties settled for a one-time payment of $75,000. As part of the settlement, Defendants stipulated to entry of judgment against them “in the full prayer of the Complaint,” but Vitatech agreed to “forbear” from filing the stipulation and to accept the $75,000 “as full Settlement of its claims against Defendants” if they paid by the designated date. When Defendants failed to pay, Vitatech filed the stipulation and the trial court entered judgment against Defendants for more than $300,000, which included compensatory damages, prejudgment interest, attorney fees, and costs. Sporn and appellant CortiSlim International, Inc. (collectively, Appellants) moved to vacate the judgment, arguing it was an unenforceable penalty and liquidated damages provision under Civil Code section 1671(b). The trial court denied the motion because it found the judgment’s higher amount was not a penalty or liquidated damages provision subject to section 1671(b). Rather, the court concluded the reduced amount Vitatech agreed to accept was merely a discount if Defendants paid their debt as agreed. The Court of Appeal reversed and remanded for the trial court to grant the motion and enter a new judgment for the $75,000 settlement amount, plus trial court costs. Under well-established precedent, including this court’s decision in Greentree Financial Group, Inc. v. Execute Sports, Inc., 163 Cal.App.4th 495 (2008), the stipulated judgment for more than four times the amount Vitatech agreed to accept as full settlement of its claims was an unenforceable penalty because it bore no reasonable relationship to the range of damages the parties could have anticipated would result from Defendants’ failure timely to pay the settlement amount. “Although Defendants stipulated to entry of judgment if they did not timely pay, they never admitted liability on the underlying claims or the amount of damages allegedly caused by the breach of the underlying contract.” View "Viatech International, Inc. v. Sporn" on Justia Law

Denton sued his employer, San Francisco, alleging workplace retaliation, disability discrimination (disparate treatment, failure to accommodate, failure to engage in the interactive process), defamation, violation of the Confidentiality of Medical Information Act (Civ. Code 56), hostile work environment harassment, and failure to prevent harassment, discrimination, or retaliation, and against his supervisor, alleging defamation and hostile work environment harassment. After defendants moved for summary judgment, negotiations led to a settlement ($250,000). Denton’s then-counsel filed a notice of conditional settlement. A week later, after Denton discharged his attorney, defendants’ counsel successfully applied ex parte to have the settlement set aside, despite Denton twice assuring defendants’ counsel that he was not backing out of the settlement. Four days later, at the hearing on defendants’ summary judgment motion, Denton, appearing in propria persona, requested a continuance to oppose the motion. The trial court denied the request and granted defendants’ motion as unopposed. The court of appeal reversed. The trial court abused its discretion. To the extent the court implied that Denton was not diligent, the implication is not supported by the record. Defendants’ counsel acknowledged as much at the hearing. View "Denton v. City and County of San Francisco" on Justia Law

The Court of Appeal addressed whether, for purposes of overcoming the workers' compensation exclusivity doctrine (Lab. Code, section 3600(a) and 3602(a)), an employee’s statements against her hotel employer for violating provisions in the California Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA), were sufficient to protect her from nonemployee sexual harassment. The employee alleged facts showing: (1) she was raped while working on the employer's premises by a drunk nonemployee trespasser; (2) the employer knew or should have known the trespasser was on the employer's premises for about an hour before the rape occurred; and (3) the employer knew or should have known that, while on the employer's premises, the trespasser had aggressively propositioned at least one other housekeeping employee for sexual favors. The Court of Appeal concluded these facts were sufficient to state claims under the FEHA for sexual harassment by a nonemployee and for failure to prevent such harassment. Because the superior court determined otherwise and dismissed the employee's operative third amended complaint (complaint) after sustaining the employer's demurrer to it without leave to amend, the Court reversed the judgment and remanded the matter to the trial court for further proceedings. View "M.F. v. Pacific Pearl Hotel Management LLC" on Justia Law

Plaintiff YDM Management Company, Inc. (YDM) appeals from a judgment of the trial court in favor of defendant Sharp Community Medical Group, Inc. (Sharp), after Sharp successfully moved for summary judgment of YDM's operative complaint. YDM purchased accounts receivable from Doctors Express, a company that operated urgent care facilities in San Diego, for services rendered to Sharp managed care members. In its role as an Independent Practice Association (IPA), Sharp provided health insurance to its managed care members, and paid claims for services provided to its members. At the time that it provided the services at issue to Sharp members, Doctors Express did not have a preferred provider contract with Sharp. Providers without a contract with an IPA were reimbursed for nonemergency medical services provided to the IPA's members at amounts significantly less than the "reasonable and customary value for the health care services rendered." However, an IPA such as Sharp was required by regulation to reimburse out of network providers for the full "reasonable and customary value" for any emergency medical services provided to its members. As the assignee of Doctors Express, YDM filed this lawsuit seeking additional reimbursement from Sharp for services provided by Doctors Express to members of Sharp's health plan, beyond the amount that Sharp had already reimbursed Doctors Express for those services. The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of Sharp. On appeal, YDM contended the trial court erred in granting summary judgment in Sharp's favor based on the declaration of a Sharp employee, and that the court erred in failing to give adequate consideration to the declaration of YDM's expert in concluding that there was no triable issue of material fact. The Court of Appeal concluded the trial court did not err in granting summary judgment in favor of Sharp. View "YDM Management Co., Inc. v. Sharp Community Med. etc." on Justia Law

Plaintiff-appellant Paul Kendall's second amended complaint made several types of class-wide claims that challenged the billing and collection practices of the health facility operating an emergency room where he received care, defendant and respondent Scripps Health (Scripps). Kendall contended that "selfpay" patients, who signed a form during the reception process at the emergency room (an "Agreement for Services at a Scripps Facility"), were being unfairly billed under that contractual agreement at prescribed rates that are listed on a publicly available "charge description master" (Charge Master). This appeal arose out of the trial court's order denying Kendall's motion to certify a proposed class of self-pay patients for the pursuit of two overriding legal theories that applied to both the declaratory relief and statutory claims. Scripps opposed the motion, arguing a class action was not shown to be an appropriate method to pursue the case because of a lack of predominant common issues and of any convincing showing of an ability to ascertain the identity of all the proposed class members. The trial court denied the motion for class certification, concluding that Kendall had not presented any substantial evidence showing there were predominant common issues of law and fact among the putative class members. On appeal, Kendall contends the trial court's order denying class certification of his statutory claims reflects the use of improper criteria and an incorrect legal analysis. Finding no abuse of discretion or lack of substantial evidence, the Court of Appeal affirmed the order denying class certification. View "Kendall v. Scripps Health" on Justia Law