Justia California Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Patricia and Thomas married in 1989 and had twins in 1996. A judgment dissolving their marriage was entered in 2002. Thomas began representing himself. In 2005, the court deemed Thomas a vexatious litigant and issued an order prohibiting him from filing new motions or litigation when representing himself without first obtaining leave of the presiding judge (Code Civil Procedure 391.7). In 2018, the trial court reaffirmed its vexatious litigant finding and again imposed a prefiling order. Representing himself, Thomas appealed. His briefs contained “menacing” and “odious” language making “implicit threats" against members of the judiciary and attorneys. Thomas challenged those orders and rulings made years earlier.In 2020, the court of appeal declined to consider Thomas’s challenges to the long-final orders and warned Thomas that further “use of the appellate process to threaten” would “result in an order of sanctions.” The court upheld the 2018 vexatious litigant and prefiling orders. In 2021, Thomas filed seven requests to file new litigation, along with numerous other documents. The court determined the requests to file lacked merit and had “no basis or legitimate purpose.” The court of appeal denied a writ petition and notified Thomas it was considering dismissing the appeal as frivolous, giving him the opportunity to address possible sanctions. The court subsequently dismissed the appeal as “objectively and subjectively frivolous.” View "Marriage of Deal" on Justia Law

St. Paul Fire and Marine Insurance Company (St. Paul Fire & Marine) and multiple other appellants (collectively, the St. Paul Insurers or sometimes St. Paul) appealed a California trial court’s order staying their declaratory judgment insurance coverage action. The trial court issued the stay in recognition of a "bellwether case of national importance" that was ongoing in West Virginia (WV coverage action), which, like this, arose from the opioid prescription abuse and addiction crisis. The WV coverage action commenced in March 2017, nearly four years before plaintiffs filed their complaint here. At the time the trial court issued its stay, proceedings had progressed significantly in West Virginia. The trial court found that in this action and in the WV coverage action “some of the same insurance policies are at issue in both cases, and the West Virginia court will be interpreting at least one of St. Paul’s policies to determine whether they cover opioid litigation, an answer that presumably will be the same whether the underlying litigation is in West Virginia or some other state.” St. Paul challenged the trial court’s stay order, arguing it constituted an abuse of discretion. The California Court of Appeal concluded St. Paul failed to meet its burden to demonstrate an abuse of discretion, and affirmed the order. View "St. Paul Fire & Marine Ins. Co. v. AmerisourceBergen Corp." on Justia Law

The City of Coronado, City of Imperial Beach, City of Lemon Grove, and City of Solana Beach (collectively “the Cities”) filed a combined petition for writ of administrate mandate and complaint for injunctive and declaratory relief against the San Diego Association of Governments and its board of directors (The Board) (collectively SANDAG). In their petition/complaint, the Cities maintained that SANDAG denied them a fair hearing when deciding the Cities’ administrative appeals of SANDAG’s regional housing needs assessment (RHNA): (1) by unfairly using a “weighted vote” procedure in which member jurisdictions cast votes based on their respective populations rather than a “tally vote” in which each member jurisdiction has a single, evenly-weighted vote; and (2) certain members of the Board were biased against the Cities and that their decision to deny the Cities’ administrative appeals was “predetermined,” thereby “rendering the decision on the [a]ppeals invalid.” In their prayer for relief, the Cities requested that the trial court enter a judgment “rescind[ing],” the “Final RHNA allocation.” The trial court sustained SANDAG’s demurrer without leave to amend, and entered judgment in its favor. On appeal, the Cities contend that the trial court erred in concluding that City of Irvine v. Southern California Assn. of Governments, 175 Cal.App.4th 506 (2009) precluded their action. The Cities also argued the Legislature’s 2004 deletion of the prior provision authorizing judicial review of an RHNA allocation was “not determinative” as to the court’s jurisdiction to entertain the Cities’ challenge to the fairness of the RHNA process in this case. The Court of Appeal concurred with the trial court that City of Irvine controlled, and barred the Cities' action. View "City of Coronado v. San Diego Assn. of Governments" on Justia Law

Plaintiff filed a consolidated class action against his former employer, Pacific Bell Telephone Company ("Employer"). Plaintiff claimed Employer violated California law by failing to provide lawful meal and rest periods and failing to provide lawful itemized wage statements among other Labor Code violations. Plaintiff appealed four orders of the trial court: 1) an order denying class certification to five meal and rest period classes; (2) an order granting summary adjudication of Plaintiff's claim relating to wage statements; (3) an order striking Plaintiff's claim under section 226, subdivision (a)(6); and (4) an order granting summary adjudication of Plaintiff's claim under the Labor Code Private Attorneys General Act of 2004 ("PAGA").Preliminarily, the Second Appellate District held that Plaintiff's third issue challenging the trial court's order striking his claim under section 226, subdivision (a)(6) was not appealable. Moving on to the merits of the remaining claims, the court held 1.) the trial court erred in refusing to certify the meal and rest period classes based on its conclusion that common issues do not predominate; 2.) the trial court properly denied Plaintiff's wage-statement claim; and 3.) the trial court properly dismissed plaintiff's PAGA claim. View "Meza v. Pacific Bell Telephone Co." on Justia Law

Plaintiff executed a 2007 note for over a million dollars. She defaulted on her payments and applied for a loan modification in 2017. After a 2018 foreclosure sale, Plaintiff brought a wrongful foreclosure action against a bank and Rushmore Loan Management Services, LLC. During discovery answered a key contention interrogatory with one word: “Unsure.” When later confronted with a defense summary judgment motion, however, Plaintiff developed belated clarity and finally specified the type of wrongdoing she was accusing Defendant of committing.   The Second Appellate District affirmed the trial court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of Defendants. The court explained that Code of Civil Procedure section 2030.310 provides a mechanism for parties to amend responses to interrogatories under certain circumstances, yet Plaintiff did not attempt to amend. Thus, Plaintiff's untimely and contradictory effort cannot support any attack on this grant of summary judgment, which was proper. View "Field v. U.S. Bank Nat. Assn." on Justia Law

A Surety on a $50,000 bail bond appeals from an order denying its motion to set aside a summary judgment entered on the bond. Surety contends the summary judgment entered on the bail bond is voidable and must be vacated because it was not filed within 90 days after the appearance period expired as required by Penal 2 Code section 1306, subdivision (c).   The trial court concluded the Surety was estopped from arguing the reinstatement order was void. As Surety’s challenge to the summary judgment was based on the invalidity of the reinstatement order, the court concluded that the challenge must fail.   The Fifth Appellate District agreed with Surety’s contention that the trial court lacked the authority to reinstate the bond after the appearance period expired. However, the trial court correctly decided that Surety’s conduct estopped it from raising the invalidity of the reinstatement order as a basis for vacating the summary judgment. Here, Surety (1) had prior notice that a reinstatement order would be entered, (2) gave its written consent to the reinstatement, (3) paid a $50 reinstatement fee a few days after the reinstatement order, and (4) benefited when the forfeited $50,000 bail bond was reinstated. Furthermore, the trial court relied on Surety’s consent when it vacated the forfeiture and reinstated the bail bond. The court concluded such circumstances estop Surety from arguing the reinstatement order was invalid. Because the invalidity of the reinstatement order is a necessary condition to Surety’s argument that the summary judgment is voidable. View "P. v. Accredited Surety and Casualty Co." on Justia Law

D.Z. and T.Z. moved to Cool, California in February 2018. The Z.s’ property shared a property line with L.B. and M.S.’s property. According to D.Z., L.B. has “relentlessly stalked and harassed” the Z.s since the Z.s moved to Cool. L.B. and M.S. appealed an order granting D.Z. a civil harassment restraining order pursuant to California Code of Civil Procedure section 527.6. L.B. and M.S. argued their due process rights were violated when the court issued the order: L.B.’s rights were violated because the order was issued after a hearing at which D.Z.’s witnesses appeared via video conference, but L.B. only appeared by telephone; M.S.’s rights were violated because he was not named and given notice as a respondent to the petition, and he did not appear in the action in the trial court. After review, the Court of Appeal found L.B. forfeited her challenge to the order as it applied to her by failing to object to the video conference versus telephone appearances during the hearing in the trial court. The Court reversed the trial court’s order to the extent it bound M.S.: "Here, M.S. was not identified as a party to be restrained in D.Z.’s petition, and the content of the petition and accompanying declaration gave no indication that (a) M.S.’s behavior would be at issue at the hearing, or (b) that the hearing would result in an order expressly prohibiting certain actions on his part. While the order might not identify M.S. may as the 'Restrained Person,' and the prohibition it places on his conduct is seemingly minor, as worded, the order is still a formal order of which M.S. might run afoul, independent of any action or influence of his wife. ... This was a violation of M.S.’s right to due process." View "D.Z. v. L.B." on Justia Law

Appellant Andrew Kam Lee argued that a punitive damages award equal to the value of his alleged interest in real property held by an LLC of which he was once a member was excessive under California law and not supported by substantial evidence of his ability to pay the punitive damages award. Respondents brought an action against appellant alleging various forms of invasion of privacy; infliction of emotional distress; violation of Penal Code section 635, which penalizes the use of devices to eavesdrop on the telephone communications of others without permission; trespass to real property; and negligent infliction of emotional distress. The bench trial took place in August 2019. Respondents were represented by counsel and appellant appeared in pro. per. According to the Summary of Proposed Settled Statement approved by the trial court, at trial appellant, “testified he sold his 1/6 interest [in the LLC] to his siblings on November 30, 2016. The Court of Appeal found that the six Doe respondents failed to introduce any other evidence regarding appellant’s capacity to pay punitive damages, and the Court agreed this award was excessive given the evidence. Because the Court vacated the punitive damages award as excessive and not supported by substantial evidence, the Court did not reach appellant's abuse-of-discretion issue. View "Doe v. Lee" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs-appellants Alan Dohner and William Gerber were, when their lawsuits were filed, general population inmates living in dormitory housing at Chuckawalla Valley State Prison (CVSP). They claimed they had the right to possess a personal television in their cells, rather than being limited to shared televisions located in common areas. They raised various claims flowing from the enforcement of the regulations that prohibited them from doing so. The trial court rejected all the claims, denying their request for a writ of habeas corpus without issuing an order to show cause and sustaining respondents’ demurrer to their claims for a writ of mandate and declaratory relief. Finding no reversible error in the trial court's rulings, the Court of Appeal affirmed. View "In re Dohner" on Justia Law

After being terminated from a position with Sacramento County (the County), plaintiff-appellant Cynthia Vatalaro sued the County for unlawful retaliation under Labor Code section 1102.5. Vatalaro alleged that, in violation of this statute, the County retaliated against her after she reported that she was working below her service classification. The County moved for summary judgment, contending Vatalaro could not show that she had a reasonable belief, or any belief at all, that the information she disclosed evidenced a violation of any law. The County added that, regardless, Vatalaro’s claim still failed because the County had a legitimate, nonretaliatory reason for terminating her. The trial court, agreeing with the County on both these points, granted summary judgment in the County’s favor. On appeal, Vatalaro alleges that the trial court was wrong on both these issues. The Court of Appeal affirmed, though on a ground somewhat different than those raised at the trial level: "the relevant standard is not whether the County demonstrated it had such a [non-discriminatory] reason; it is instead whether the County 'demonstrate[d] by clear and convincing evidence that the alleged action would have occurred for legitimate, independent reasons even if the employee had not engaged in activities protected by Section 1102.5.'" View "Vatalaro v. County of Sacramento" on Justia Law