Judge: Audra Mori, Case: 20STCV16349, Date: 2023-01-10 Tentative Ruling

Case Number: 20STCV16349    Hearing Date: January 10, 2023    Dept: 31

SUPERIOR COURT OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

FOR THE COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES - CENTRAL DISTRICT

On April 29, 2020, Plaintiffs Patricio Harris (“Harris”) and Cheuk Ying Lam (collectively, “Plaintiffs”) filed this action against defendants Manuel Hernandez (“Hernandez”), Shatha Alhazmi, and Does 1-50 for damages arising from a motor vehicle accident that allegedly occurred on or about April 3, 2018.  The complaint alleges a single cause of action for negligence against all defendants.  Hernandez filed his answer to the complaint on April 27, 2022. 

Plaintiff has filed amendments to complaint naming Uber Technologies, Raiser LLC, and Raiser-CA LLC (collectively, the “Uber Defendants”) as Does 1, 2, and 3, respectively.  On December 9, 2022, the Uber Defendants filed the instant demurrer to the complaint contending that Plaintiff’s claims are barred by the applicable statute of limitations under CCP § 335.1 because the complaint was filed more than two years after the date of the subject accident. 

On December 29, 2022, seven court days before this hearing, Harris filed an opposition to the demurrer.  Harris asserts that the accident actually occurred on May 3, 2018, but the complaint mistakenly lists the date of loss as April 3, 2018.  On December 30, 2022, Plaintiff filed a purported First Amended Complaint (“FAC”) alleging that the accident occurred on May 3, 2018.  The FAC alleges a single cause of action against all parties for negligence. 

In reply, the Uber Defendants assert that neither the late opposition nor the FAC was served on them.  They provide that the parties met and conferred prior to the filing of the opposition and agreed that the Uber Defendants would withdraw this demurrer once Plaintiffs filed a motion for leave to amend.

CCP § 472(a) states:

A party may amend its pleading once without leave of the court at any time before the answer, demurrer, or motion to strike is filed, or after a demurrer or motion to strike is filed but before the demurrer or motion to strike is heard if the amended pleading is filed and served no later than the date for filing an opposition to the demurrer or motion to strike. A party may amend the pleading after the date for filing an opposition to the demurrer or motion to strike, upon stipulation by the parties. The time for responding to an amended pleading shall be computed from the date of service of the amended pleading.

(Emphasis added.) 

In Barton v. Khan (2007) 157 Cal.App.4th 1216, the trial court erred in refusing to accept an amended complaint by the plaintiff where a corporate defendant answered the complaint and other individual defendants demurred.  The Court of Appeal stated the following: 

Here, this principle of efficiency was turned on its head. The Individual Defendants did not answer the complaint, but demurred. The hearing on the demurrer was set for September 19, 2005. On September 16, 2005, prior to that hearing, Barton attempted to file an amended complaint against the Individual Defendants. Under our interpretation of section 472, the clerk should have accepted Barton’s amended complaint for filing. Had the clerk done so, the hearing on the demurrer would have been taken off calendar, and the Individual Defendants would have had the opportunity to demur to the amended complaint. Instead, three hearings have been held in the trial court, one hearing has been conducted in this court, and many pages of paper and hours of attorney time have been expended for naught. In short, the trial court erred in refusing to accept the amended complaint for filing or giving Barton leave to amend.

(Id. at 1220-21 [holding that one defendant’s filing of an answer does not divest the plaintiff of the right to amend the complaint with respect to the causes of action brought against other demurring defendants].)

            The Court has discretion to accept the untimely amendment by Plaintiffs in this case.  (See Harlan v. Department of Transp. (2005) 132 Cal.App.4th 868, 872-76 [referring to discretion to accept plaintiff’s late filed amended complaint, though plaintiffs did not move for leave to file late].)  In the absence of any prejudice to the defendants, and in light of the strong policy favoring resolution of cases on their merits, the Court exercises its discretion to accept the FAC.  This will allow the Uber Defendants to demurrer to the FAC, if they wish to do so, without the parties expending further resources and efforts directed at the complaint that Plaintiffs admit contains incorrect information.[1]   

            Therefore, the demurrer is moot and taken off-calendar.  The ruling is without prejudice as to Defendant’s ability to file a demurrer or other appropriate motion to challenge the sufficiency of the FAC.  To the extent that Plaintiffs have not served the FAC on all parties, Plaintiffs are ordered to do so within five (5) days.  Plaintiff is admonished that further filing late papers in this action may result in the Court disregarding the papers and/or setting an Order to Show Cause Re: Why Plaintiffs’ Counsel should not be Sanctioned.

Moving Defendants are ordered to give notice. 

PLEASE TAKE NOTICE:

• Parties are encouraged to meet and confer after reading this tentative ruling to see if they can reach an agreement.
• If a party intends to submit on this tentative ruling, the party must send an email to the court at sscdept31@lacourt.org with the Subject line “SUBMIT” followed by the case number.  The body of the email must include the hearing date and time, counsel’s contact information, and the identity of the party submitting.  
• Unless all parties submit by email to this tentative ruling, the parties should arrange to appear remotely (encouraged) or in person for oral argument.  You should assume that others may appear at the hearing to argue.  
• If the parties neither submit nor appear at hearing, the Court may take the motion off calendar or adopt the tentative ruling as the order of the Court.  After the Court has issued a tentative ruling, the Court may prohibit the withdrawal of the subject motion without leave. 

Dated this 10^th day of January 2023