Judge: Bradley S. Phillips, Case: 24STCV00036, Date: 2025-04-23 Tentative Ruling
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Case Number: 24STCV00036 Hearing Date: April 23, 2025 Dept: 26
Jane Doe v. Walt Disney Company No. 24STCV00036
Tentative Ruling on Demurrer
Plaintiff filed her Complaint,
including claims for sexual harassment, sexual assault and/or battery, failure
to investigate and prevent sexual harassment, and negligence, on January 2,
2024. The Court previously ruled that
those claims were barred by the statute of limitations. In doing so, the Court interpreted Code of
Civil Procedure § 340.16(e) to revive claims related to alleged sexual assault
only if such claims were filed on or before December 30, 2023, and interpreted
that provision to preclude application of Code of Civil Procedure § 12a to
extend the time for filing to January 2, 2024 (because December 30, 2023, was a
Saturday and December 31, 2023 and January 1, 2024, were both court holidays).
The Court may, on its own motion,
reconsider prior interim orders for the purpose of correcting the Court’s own
errors. (Le Francois v. Goel
(2005) 35 Cal.4th 1094, 1107.)
In doing so, “[the Court] should inform the parties of the concern,
solicit briefing, and hold a hearing.” (Id.
at 1108.) Here, the Court informed the
parties of its concern on March 18, 2025, and set a briefing schedule. Thereafter, the Court set a hearing date of
April 23, 2025.
Having reconsidered the prior
ruling, the Court now overrules Defendants’ demurrer, finding that Plaintiff’s
Complaint was timely filed on January 2, 2024.
The Court holds both that Code of Civil Procedure 12a applies to extend
the time for the filing of Plaintiff’s Complaint and that the “last day” for
her filing was December 31, 2023.
Because December 30, 2023, was a Saturday, however, Section 12a would
extend her time to January 2, 2024, even if the “last day” were December 30.
Section 340.16(e)(1) provides:
Notwithstanding any other law, any claim seeking to recover
damages suffered as a result of a sexual assault that occurred on or after the
plaintiff’s 18th birthday that would otherwise be barred before
January 1, 2023, solely because the applicable statute of limitations has or
had expired, is hereby revived, and a cause of action may proceed if already
pending in court on January 1, 2023, or, if not filed by that date, may be
commenced between January 1, 2023, and December 31, 2023.
(Code Civ. Proc. §340.16, subd. (e)(1).)
The Court finds that the phrase
“notwithstanding any other law” precludes the application of any statute of
limitations that would, inconsistent with the remainder of the subdivision, bar
a claim for damages suffered as a result of a sexual assault that occurred on
or after the plaintiff’s 18th birthday. Application of such a law would be in direct
conflict with the revival provision set forth in section 340.16(e)(1) – it
would bar precisely the claims that are to be revived. (See Arias v. Superior Court (2009) 46
Cal.4th 969, 983 [holding that “notwithstanding any other provision
of law” is “a ‘term of art’ that declares the legislative intent to override
all contrary law”] [emphasis in original]; People v. Superior Court
(Romero) (1996) 13 Cal.4th 497, 524 [holding that
“[notwithstanding any other law] … eliminates potential conflicts
between alternative sentencing schemes,” not all other sentencing provisions]
[emphasis added]; see also People v. Hojnowski (2014) 228 Cal.App.4th
794, 801 [following Romero].).
The phrase, “notwithstanding any
other law” does not, however, preclude the application of Code of Civil
Procedure § 12a to extend the time in which to file beyond either December 30
or December 31, 2023. If the statute simply
read, “notwithstanding any other law, a cause of action may proceed if …
commenced between January 1, 2023, and December 31, 2023,” no sensible reading
of that provision would bar application of section 12a. There is no conflict or inconsistency: if a plaintiff meets the filing deadline of
December 30 or 31, the claim may proceed.
Under the general rule of section 12a, filing on January 2, 2024, satisfies
the requirement of filing by December 30 or 31.
Defendants argue that “
‘notwithstanding any other law’ means ‘notwithstanding any other law that sets
a contrary filing deadline.’”
(Defendants’ Supp. Reply at p. 7.)
But section 12a does not set a “contrary filing deadline.” The “filing deadline” is either December 30 or
December 31, but, as with all other filing deadlines, section 12a extends that
deadline to the following day on which the courts are open.
Defendants’ reliance on Steele
v. Bartlett (1941) 18 Cal.2d 573 and Hutchins v. Cnty. Clerk of Merced
Cnty. (1934) 140 Cal.App. 348 is misplaced.
In both of those cases, the courts held that section 12a does not apply
to extend a deadline that provides that an act must be done a certain number of
days “before” or “prior to” an election. (Steele, 18 Cal.2d at 574; Hutchins,
140 Cal.App. at 349-350.) By contrast,
in Parsons v. Estenson Logistics, Inc. (2022) 86 Cal.App.5th
1260, the Court of Appeal held that section 12a does apply where a
statute provides that an act must be done “not more” than a specified
number of days after an event. (86
Cal.App.5th at 1266-1271.)
Defendants’ argument that the entire
purpose of the phrase, “notwithstanding any other law,” in section 340.16(e)(1)
is to bar application of section 12a (as opposed to barring application of
conflicting limitations provisions) is frivolous. The whole purpose of section 340.16(e) is to
make sure that sexual assault claims are not barred by otherwise applicable
statutes of limitation. The suggestion
that “notwithstanding any other law” was meant to bar a one, two, or three-day
extension for filing, as opposed to constituting “belt and suspenders” to
ensure no other limitations period could be applied, is meritless.
The issue whether section 340.16(e)(1)
means that December 30, 2023, or December 31, 2023, is the last day to file a revived
cause of action is, in the end, immaterial to this demurrer. December 30, 2023, was a Saturday; December
31, 2023, was a Sunday; and, of course, January 1, 2024, was a Court
holiday. Thus, regardless of whether
December 30 or 31 was the “last day,” Rule 12a would extend the filing deadline
to January 2, 2024. And there is no even
plausible argument that “between January 1, 2023, and December 31, 2023,” makes
the last day to file December 29, 2023 (the last Friday of 2023).
That said, the Court disagrees with
the interpretation that would make December 30, rather than December 31, the
last day. Indeed, in their original
demurrer, Defendants did not even make that argument. To the contrary, Defendants correctly cited the
opinion of the Court of Appeal in Jane Doe #21 (S.H.) v. CFR Enterprises,
Inc., (2023) 93 Cal.App.5th 1199, to the effect that section
340.16(e)”establishes a one-year window reviving [sexual assault] claims”
and that it “revives [such claims] until December 31, 2023.” (Id. at 1210-1211 [emphases
added].) And Defendants cited multiple
passages from the Legislative history of section 340.16(e) to the effect that
the revival was for a “one-year period from January 1, 2023, until December
31, 2023.” (S. Judiciary Analysis,
AB 2777, (2021-2022), June 14, 2022, p.6; Assemb B. Third Reading Analysis, AB
2777, (2021-2022), May 4, 2022, p. 3.)
If one has “until” December 31,
2023, in which to perform an act, doing so on December 31, 2023,
satisfies the requirement (as in, “you may have until Friday to complete
your homework” – turning it in on Friday satisfies the requirement). And a revival period of January 2, 2023,
through December 30, 2023, is not a revival period of “one year.” Thus, notwithstanding the provision’s use of
the word “between,” the Court finds that the only reasonable interpretation of
section 340.16(e) is that December 31, 2023, was the last day for filing. That day being a Sunday, and January 1, 2024,
being a Court holiday, a filing on January 2, 2024, was timely.
Finally, Defendants argue that
Plaintiff’s Complaint must be dismissed because she did not timely file an
administrative complaint under FEHA. But
section 340.16(e)(1) provides that “any claim … that would otherwise be barred
before January 1, 2023, solely because the applicable statute of limitations
has or had expired, is hereby revived….”
(Code Civ. Proc. § 340.16, subd. (e)(1).) The California Supreme Court has held that the
deadline for filing an administrative complaint under FEHA “is ‘[t]he statute
of limitations for FEHA actions.’” (Pollock
v. Tri-Modal Distribution Services, Inc. (2021) 11 Cal.5th 918, 931
[quoting Richards v. CH2M Hill, Inc. (2001) 26 Cal.4th 798,
811].) Accordingly, under section
340.16(e)(1), a claim that would be barred solely by reason of the deadline
(the “statute of limitations”) for filing an administrative complaint is
revived.
That result is the only one that is
consistent with the Legislative purpose to revive sexual assault claims. A contrary rule would create a situation in
which many (if not all or nearly all) sexual-assault claims that were not filed
in court within the applicable statute of limitations, but were intended to be
revived by section 340.16(e), would nevertheless be barred because, in all
likelihood, an administrative claim was also not filed earlier, for the same
reasons that a lawsuit was not filed (reasons that were the motivating factor
in the Legislature’s enactment of the revival statute).
For all the foregoing reasons,
Defendants’ demurrer to Plaintiff’s Complaint is overruled.