LAW & MOTION CALENDAR
TENTATIVE RULINGS
March 30, 2023
09:00 a.m. and 2:00 p.m.
CX-104
JUDGE WILLIAM D. CLASTER
Department CX104 Phone Number: (657) 622-5304
The Court will hear oral argument on all matters at the time noticed for the hearing. If you would prefer to submit the matter on your papers without oral argument, please advise the clerk by calling (657) 622-5304. The Court will not entertain a request for continuance nor filing of further documents once the ruling has been posted.
APPEARANCES: Appearances, whether remote or in person, must be in compliance with new Code of Civil Procedure §367.75, California Rules of Court, Rule 3.672, and Superior Court of California, County of Orange, Appearance Procedure and Information, Civil Unlimited and Complex, located at https://www.occourts.org/media-relations/covid/Civil_Unlimited_and_Complex_Appearance_Procedure_and_Information.pdf.
COURT REPORTERS: Official court reporters (i.e. court reporters employed by the Court) are NOT provided for any matters in this department. If a party desires a record of a law and motion proceeding, it will be the party’s responsibility to provide a court reporter. Parties must comply with the Court’s policy on the use of privately retained court reporters which can be found at:
· Civil Court Reporter Pooling; and
· For additional information, please see the court’s website at Court Reporter Interpreter Services for additional information regarding the availability of court reporters.
· Civil Limited, Unlimited and Complex (Updated June 11, 2020)
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20-01151624
Montano vs. JGT, Inc.
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1. Plaintiff Poito
Montano's Notice of Motion and Motion to Compel Responses to Request for
Production of Documents, Set No. One; and Request Imposing Monetary Sanctions
Against Defendant King Relocation Services, and Their Counsel in the Amount
of $2,500.00 ROA 83 Before the Court are four discovery motions. I. Defendant’s Motions for Protective Orders Defendant King Van & Storage, Inc. (apparently erroneously named as King Relocation Services) moves for entry of two protective orders against plaintiff Polito Montano. The first motion concerns two sets of written discovery served by Plaintiff, while the second concerns a PMK deposition. Both motions are DENIED. Plaintiff seeks aggrieved employee discovery in support of his PAGA claim against Defendant. Defendant contends it never employed Plaintiff at all, meaning Plaintiff lacks standing to bring a PAGA claim against it, and as a result any PAGA discovery is necessarily unduly burdensome. It therefore seeks an order barring Plaintiff from discovering facts about allegedly aggrieved employees. In its moving papers, Defendant cites no source of authority for entry of a protective order, the specific relief Defendant seeks here. Instead, Defendant focuses on the merits of Plaintiff’s PAGA claim and his perceived lack of standing. That said, the Civil Discovery Act allows a party served with a deposition notice, interrogatories, or requests for production to seek a protective order. (See CCP §§ 2025.420 [deposition]; 2030.090 [interrogatories]; 2031.060 [requests for production].) Each of these statutes requires that a motion for a protective order be “accompanied by a meet and confer declaration under Section 2016.040.” Defendant’s moving papers contain no declaration attesting that the parties met and conferred about a protective order prior to the filing of these motions. As a result, the motions are denied for failure to meet and confer. II. Plaintiff’s Motions to Compel As set forth in the declarations of Jonathan LaCour attached to each motion to compel, Plaintiff served special interrogatories and requests for production on Defendant in November 2021. These discovery requests sought information about the putative aggrieved employees. Defendant has never responded to the discovery requests. It has not even provided objection-only responses. In its opposing papers, Defendant makes the same arguments that support its requests for protective orders. Because Defendant failed to respond to Plaintiff’s discovery requests, these objections are waived by operation of law. (See CCP §§ 2030.290(a) [interrogatories]; 2031.300(a) [requests for production].) The motions to compel are GRANTED. By no later than April 30, 2023, Defendant is to serve complete responses, without objection, to Plaintiff’s first set of special interrogatories and first set of requests for production, with the exception of those discovery requests that seek personally identifying information of the aggrieved employees. As to those requests that seek personally identifying information, the parties are ordered to go through a Belaire-West process and afford the aggrieved employees an opportunity to opt out. For those requests, Defendant is to serve complete responses, without objection, by no later than 30 days after completion of the Belaire-West process. Plaintiffs seek sanctions of $2,500 against Defendant and its counsel on each motion, for a total of $5,000. The Court “shall” order such sanctions unless Defendant acted with substantial justification in opposing the motions. (CCP §§ 2030.290(c) [interrogatories]; 2031.300(c) [requests for production].) The Court finds Defendant acted without substantial justification. Whatever the merits of Defendant’s underlying objections, the failure to serve any responses meant those objections were waived. Defendant never explains why it was justified in failing entirely to respond to discovery requests rather than serving objection-only responses. Furthermore, “[f]ailing to respond or to submit to an authorized method of discovery” is a misuse of the discovery process. (CCP § 2023.010(d).) Plaintiff’s counsel declares he has “expended a significant amount of time in preparation of [each] motion.” (See both LaCour Decls., ¶ 15.) It appears to the Court that the two motions are almost entirely identical. The Court will therefore enter a single sanction of $2,500, to be paid to Plaintiff by April 30, 2023. This sanction is entered jointly and severally against Defendant and its counsel of record, the Law Offices of Charles M. Farano. |
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20-01168166
Hickey vs. Florence Crittenton Services of Orange County, Inc.
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Plaintiff Alessandro James Hickey's Notice of Motion and Motion for Approval of Class Action Settlement ROA 115
Plaintiff’s motion for final approval of class action settlement is GRANTED. The Court approves the following distributions: 1. Attorney’s fees in the amount of $225,000, or 30% of the GSA. The Court finds this amount to be a reasonable result in light of the quality of the result obtained, the work performed by class counsel, a review of the billing records provided, and the estimated lodestar. In approving these amounts and examining the billing records provided, the Court is not approving any particular hourly billing rates proposed by class counsel.
2. Litigation costs in the amount of $10,153, representing the full amount sought.
3. Administration costs in the amount of $15,000, per the administrator’s declaration.
4. An enhancement of $5,000 to Plaintiff. In making this award, the Court has considered only the factors set forth in Golba v. Dick’s Sporting Goods, Inc. (2015) 238 Cal.App.4th 1251 and Clark v. Am. Residential Servs. LLC (2009) 175 Cal.App.4th 785.
5. Payment to the LWDA of $45,000, representing the LWDA’s share of the amount allocated to the PAGA claim.
Please submit a revised proposed order that conforms to the foregoing for the Court’s signature. Pursuant to CCP § 384(b), Plaintiff shall submit to the Court a final report on or November 3, 2023 setting forth the actual amounts paid to class members and other amounts disbursed pursuant to the settlement. Upon receiving the report, the Court will determine whether further reports and/or a hearing will be necessary. |
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20-01150180
Singod Investors VI, LLC vs. KPRS Construction Services, Inc
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1. Plaintiff Singod
Investors VI, LLC's Notice of Motion and Motion to Compel Non-Party Ammco
Ornamental Iron, Inc.'s Compliance with Deposition Subpoena for Production of
Business Records; Request for Sanction in the Amount of $3,435. ROA 214 3. Plaintiff Singod Investors VI, LLC's Notice of Motion and Motion to Compel Non-Party 20/20 Plumbing & Heating, Inc.'s Compliance with Deposition Subpoena for Production of Business Records; Request for Sanctions in the Amount of $3,435.00 ROA 127 Before the Court are three motions filed by plaintiff Singod Investors VI, LLC for orders compelling compliance with deposition subpoenas for business records. All three motions are DENIED. In the motions, Singod argues an affidavit or declaration of good cause is not required because under CCP § 2020.410(c), “A deposition subpoena that commands only the production of business records for copying need not be accompanied by an affidavit or declaration showing good cause for the production of the business records designated in it.” Accordingly, Singod makes no attempt to show good cause exists for the production of the requested records. Singod appears to confuse the requirements for issuing a business records subpoena with the requirements for compelling compliance with such a subpoena. In the latter context, the moving party is required to demonstrate good cause: Section 2031, subdivision (l), which applies to document production requests served on a party, requires a party seeking to compel such production to “set forth specific facts showing good cause justifying the discovery sought by the inspection demand....” Section 2020, the statute at issue contains no such specific requirement. However, since both sections are part of a single statutory scheme, and since it is unlikely the Legislature intended to place greater burdens on a nonparty than on a party to the litigation, we read a similar requirement into the latter section. (Calcor Space Facility, Inc. v. Superior Court (1997) 53 Cal.App.4th 216, 223-224.) Calcor predates the current version of the Civil Discovery Act, but its continuing vitality was reaffirmed by the Court of Appeal, Fourth District, Division Three in 2021: “[A] party seeking to compel production of records from a nonparty must articulate specific facts justifying the discovery sought; it may not rely on mere generalities.” (Board of Registered Nursing v. Superior Court (2021) 59 Cal.App.5th 1011, 1039 [citing Calcor].) Singod has not attempted to show good cause here. Instead, it contends there is no such requirement. Because Singod fails to meet its burden of showing good cause, all three motions are denied. That being said, it appears to the Court that many of the requested documents are potentially relevant to this litigation. Because the production of these documents may move the case closer to resolution, Ammco and the two non-party recipients of the subpoenas are encouraged to cooperate with Singod and avoid another round of motions. |
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18-01012565
Weller vs. Christian Dior, Inc.
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Plaintiff Eric Weller's Notice of Motion and Motion for Order Approving Settlement Pursuant to California Labor Code Section 2698, Et Seq. (PAGA) ROA 211
The Court has reviewed the supplemental briefing filed in response to the prior minute order. Plaintiff’s motion for approval of the parties’ PAGA settlement is GRANTED, contingent upon Plaintiff amending the notice to define the undefined term “Released Parties” in the description of the release. The Court finds the parties’ settlement as amended is “fair, reasonable, and adequate in view of PAGA’s purposes to remediate present labor law violations, deter future ones, and to maximize enforcement of state labor laws.” (Moniz v. Adecco USA, Inc. (2021) 72 Cal.App.5th 56, 72.) The Court approves the following distributions:
The administrator is to file a declaration no later than November 3, 2023 to confirm that the distribution of funds to aggrieved employees is complete. Upon receipt of the administrator’s declaration, the Court will determine whether further briefing or a hearing is necessary. Please submit a revised proposed order that conforms to the foregoing for the Court’s signature. |
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21-01179611
Viramontes vs. Prestige Design Center, Inc.
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1. Plaintiff Rolando Viramontes' Notice of Motion and Motion to
Compel Defendant Prestige Design Center, Inc., Pacific Stone Construction,
Inc., and Pacific Stone Design Center Inc. to Provide Further Responses
Requests for Production of Documents, Sets One; and Request for Sanctions
Against Defendants and Their Attorney in the Amount of $2,500.00 ROA
232
NO TENTATIVE RULING WILL BE ISSUED. |