Judge: Lee W. Tsao, Case: 23NWCV01458, Date: 2024-11-13 Tentative Ruling

Case Number: 23NWCV01458    Hearing Date: November 13, 2024    Dept: C

TIFFANY PACKMAN v. JENNIFER JAYE FRASER et al.

CASE NO.: 23NWCV01458

HEARING:  11/13/24

#11

TENTATIVE ORDER

Defendant Jennifer Jaye Fraser’s unopposed demurrer is SUSTAINED with 30 days leave to amend. 

Clerk to give notice.

Background

Plaintiff Tiffany Packman (“Plaintiff”) sued Defendants Jennifer Jaye Fraser, Nicanor Mansilla, and Barbara Mansilla on May 11, 2023, asserting ten causes of action arising from the sale of a property located at 10802 Petula Place, Cerritos, California 90703 (“the Property”). Plaintiff filed the operative First Amended Complaint (“FAC”) on January 17, 2024, asserting the following claims:

(1) Fraudulent Transfer

(2) Quiet Title

(3) Partition of Real Property

(4) Breach of Contract / Trust

(5) Breach of Fiduciary Duty

(6) Conversion

(7) Accounting

(8) Dissolution of Trust / Partnership

(9) Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress, and

(10) Declaratory Relief.

Plaintiff also asserts an eleventh cause of action for civil conspiracy, not included in the caption to her FAC and labeled by heading in the body of the FAC as the “Fifth Cause of Action”.

Defendant Jennifer Jaye Fraser (“Defendant”) is the demurring party here. The Court sometimes refers to Plaintiff and Defendant as “Tiffany” and “Jennifer” respectively, and to their mother as “Sheila”, in accordance with the pleading and moving papers, and not out of familiarity or disrespect.

As alleged in the FAC and accepted as true upon demurrer: Plaintiff and Defendant are the granddaughters of Walter and Betty Hogg, prior owners of the Property. As relevant, Betty Hogg held title to the Property, as trustee of the Betty J. Hogg Living Trust dated August 29, 1990 (“the Hogg Trust”), from 1990 to 2008. (FAC, ¶¶ 20-23.) The terms of the Hogg Trust provided that upon Betty Hogg’s death, her daughter Sheila Duke, the parties’ mother, would inherit a 50% interest in the Property; her stepsister Mary (not a party) would inherit 25%; and Tiffany and Jennifer would together inherit 25%. (FAC, ¶ 22.)

Betty Hogg died on August 27, 2008; “pursuant to the terms of the [Hogg] Trust,” Sheila then “became the sole trustee of the Trust.” (FAC, ¶ 23.)

Sheila died on March 27, 2018. (Id., ¶ 24.) At that time, title to the Property either remained in the Trust, under the care of a different Trustee, or vested in Tiffany and Jennifer in their individual capacities. The FAC is unclear on this point.

Defendant has requested judicial notice of a Grant Deed dated February 20, 2019, which identifies her as Successor Trustee to the Hogg Trust. (DRJN, Exh. A (“2019 Deed”).) The 2019 Deed transfers title from Defendant in her capacity as Successor Trustee of the Hogg Trust, to Defendant in her capacity as Trustee “the WG Trust dated April 4, 2017” (“WG Trust”).

Plaintiff protests that “[t]here is no recorded document transferring the Property from Sheila as trustee of the [Hogg] Trust to Jennifer as the trustee of the [Hogg] Trust” (FAC, ¶ 24) – implying that Jennifer was not authorized to act as Successor Trustee when she transferred the Property out of the Hogg Trust and into the WG Trust via the 2019 Deed.

Approximately three years after Jennifer took ownership of the Property in her capacity as Trustee of the WG Trust, she deeded the Property to her codefendants, Nicanor and Barbara Mansilla (“the Mansillas”), on February 24, 2022 (“the 2022 Deed”). (FAC, ¶ 25.)

According to Plaintiff, “Jennifer fraudulently transferred the property first to herself and then to [the Mansillas] to avoid paying her obligation of one-half of the sales proceeds to [Plaintiff]]”. (FAC, ¶ 26.) When Plaintiff discovered the purported fraud, she sued.

On February 14, 2024, Defendant demurred to Plaintiff’s FAC.

Defendant served her demurrer on Plaintiff’s counsel by mail on February 14, 2024, satisfying Code of Civil Procedure section 1005.

Plaintiff filed no opposition, and Defendant no reply.

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Legal Standard

Where pleadings are defective, a party may raise the defect by way of a demurrer. (Coyne v. Krempels (1950) 36 Cal.2d 257, 262.) A demurrer for sufficiency tests whether the complaint alleges facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action. (Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 430.10; Young v. Gannon (2002) 97 Cal.App.4th 209, 220.)

When considering a demurrer, a court reads the allegations stated in the challenged pleading liberally and in context, and “treat[s] the demurrer as admitting all material facts properly pleaded, but not contentions, deductions or conclusions of fact or law.” (Serrano v. Priest (1971) 5 Cal.3d 584, 591.) Put differently: for purposes of demurrer, the court treats all facts alleged – but only the facts alleged – in the complaint as true. (Picton v. Anderson Union High School District (1996) 50 Cal.App.4th 726, 732.) “The only issue involved in a demurrer hearing is whether the complaint, as it stands, unconnected with extraneous matters, states a cause of action.” (Hahn v. Mirda (2007) 147 Cal.App.4th 740, 747.)

Meeting and Conference

“Before filing a demurrer ... , the demurring party shall meet and confer in person or by telephone with the party who filed the pleading that is subject to demurrer for the purpose of determining whether an agreement can be reached that would resolve the objections to be raised in the demurrer.” (Code Civ. Proc., § 430.41(a).)

Defendant, who represents herself, attests she attempted to meet and confer with Plaintiff’s attorney, and he did not respond. (Fraser Decl., p. 2.) Section 430.41 is satisfied.

Request for Judicial Notice

Defendant requests judicial notice of the Grant Deed recorded February 28, 2019, transferring ownership of the Property from Defendant as Successor Trustee of the Hogg Trust to Defendant as Trustee of the WG Trust. Defendant’s request is granted.

Discussion

Defendant demurs to all causes of action in the FAC, arguing that each fails to state a cause of action and that the Court lacks jurisdiction over their subject matter. In the body of her demurrer, Defendant also argues all of Plaintiff’s causes of action are time-barred. (See Dem., 11:6-12:17.) In the first page of her Notice of Demurrer she also contends “the pleading is uncertain and [it] cannot be ascertained from the pleading whether the contract is written, oral, or is implied by conduct.”

The Court disregards Defendant’s argument regarding jurisdiction, because she does not discuss it in the body of her memorandum. The Court also disregards her argument regarding the nature of the parties’ contract, as it is not directed to any particular cause of action.

The Court regards Plaintiff’s demurrer on the basis of uncertainty to be directed to the pleading as a whole and considers it as to each cause of action.

1. Uncertainty

A demurrer for uncertainty lies where the pleading is uncertain, including where the pleading is ambiguous or unintelligible. (Code Civ. Proc. § 430.10, subd. (f); Landau v. Salam (1971) 4 Cal.3d 901, 909.) To survive demurrer, a plaintiff must set forth the essential facts of his case with reasonable precision and with particularity sufficient to acquaint a defendant with the nature, source, and extent of his cause of action. (See Semole v. Sansoucie (1972) 28 Cal.App.3d 714, 719.) 

Demurrers for uncertainty are disfavored. (Chen v. Benjamin (2019) 33 Cal.App.5th 811, 822.) Nonetheless, a defendant must have information clear and specific enough to fully comprehend a plaintiff’s allegations and respond with appropriate denials and defenses. (See Committee On Children's Television, Inc. v. General Foods Corp., supra, 35 Cal.3d at pp. 211–212.)

Plaintiff’s FAC is fatally ambiguous. It implies various breaches or instances of fraud, but it does not specify when they allegedly occurred. The allegation that “there is no document” recording the transfer from the Hogg Trust to the WG Trust suggests some sort of wrongful transfer, but Plaintiff does not allege as much directly. It is unclear from the FAC whether the Hogg Trust has been dissolved, so it is unclear whether Plaintiff asserts (1) that assets have been wrongfully appropriated from a Trust of which she is the beneficiary, or (2) that  she was not given her fair share upon the Trust’s dissolution. (Compare FAC, ¶ 32 [alleging that “title to the Property [should be] restored to the [Hogg] Trust], with FAC, 12:21-22 [praying for a finding that “Plaintiffs [sic] is the owner in fee simple” of a 50% interest].) It is unclear from the FAC when or how Defendant purportedly became Trustee of the Hogg Trust, such that she could have breached any duty to Plaintiff.

Plaintiff has pled – or in some cases implied – a number of wrongs, but she has not clearly distinguished between them. The complaint fails in its entirety for ambiguity.

2. Failure to State a Claim

The FAC suffers from several other defects that cannot be fully discussed until its ambiguity is cured.

For example, many of Plaintiff’s claims sound in fraud. Fraud allegations are not liberally construed upon a pleading challenge. General pleading of the legal conclusion of fraud is insufficient, and every element of the cause of action for fraud must be alleged fully, factually and specifically. (Wilhelm v. Pray, Price, Williams & Russell (1986) 186 Cal. App. 3d 1324, 1331; see also Quelimane Co., Inc. v. Stewart Title Guaranty Co. (1998) 19 Cal. 4th 26, 47)  Although Plaintiff alleges Defendant “willfully and surreptitiously concealed the … transfer” of the Property, she alleges no facts in support of this conclusion. (FAC, ¶ 31.) She claims only that she “is informed and believes and thereupon alleges that Jennifer fraudulently transferred the property first to herself and then to Nicanor and Barbara to avoid paying her obligation of one-half of the sales proceeds … .” (Id., ¶ 28.) Particularly given the heightened pleading standard for fraud claims, Plaintiff has not pled these claims sufficiently.

Similarly, Plaintiff has alleged no outrageous conduct that would support a claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress. (See Stoiber v. Honeychuck (1980) 101 Cal.App.3d 903, 921.) Nor has she pled any facts to support a claim for civil conspiracy between the various defendants. (See City of Industry v. Fillmore (2011) 198 Cal.App.4th 191, 212 [formation of group, common plan or design, etc.].) Most importantly, given that Plaintiff primarily sues to quiet title, she has not specified what interest Jennifer, as an individual, purports to assert in the Property – a requirement in a quiet title action. (See Code Civ. Proc., § 761.020(c) [quiet title claim must plead “the adverse claims to the title of the plaintiff against which a determination is sought”].)

This is not an exhaustive list of the defects in Plaintiff’s causes of action. Her complaint fails in its entirety for ambiguity; before this defect is cured, a full review for sufficiency is futile.

3. Statutes of Limitations

“[A] limitations period … runs from the moment a claim accrues. [Citations.] Traditionally at common law, a ‘cause of action accrues “when [it] is complete with all of its elements” – those elements being wrongdoing, harm, and causation.’ [Citations.] This is the ‘last element’ accrual rule: ordinarily, the statute of limitations runs from ‘the occurrence of the last element essential to the cause of action.’ [Citations.]” ((Aryeh v. Canon Business Solutions, Inc. (2013) 55 Cal.4th 1185, 1191-1192.)

As with the factual sufficiency of Plaintiffs’ claims, it is difficult to evaluate when Plaintiff’s claims accrued until they are clearly distinguished from one another. It appears that most of her claims stem from allegations of fraud, and that the fraud was not discovered until 2023. (See FAC, ¶ 32.) If that is the case, Plaintiff’s claims for fraudulent transfer, quiet title and partition, and breach of fiduciary duty may not be time-barred. (See Code Civ. Proc., § 338(d) [“[a] cause of action [for fraud] is not deemed to have accrued until the discovery, by the aggrieved party, of the facts constituting the fraud or mistake”]; Muktarian v. Barmby (1965) 63 Cal.2d 558, 560 [quiet title limitations period based on underlying claim]; Adams v. Hopkins (1904) 144 Cal. 19, 27 [no limitation on partition unless title has passed by prescription]; Fuller v. First Franklin Financial Corp. (2013) 216 Cal.App.4th 955, 963 [fraudulent breach of fiduciary duty follows fraud statute].) That said, Plaintiff must still allege further facts showing why the discovery tolling rule applies.

Plaintiff’s breach of contract and accounting claims appear time-barred. The statutes of limitations for breach of a written contract and for an accounting are four years. (Code Civ. Proc., § 338.) As pled, Defendant’s breach took place, at the latest, in March 2018. She did not file her action until 2023. She nods toward equitable tolling doctrines in her FAC (see FAC, ¶ 32), but that is insufficient. Equitable tolling must be pled with specific facts. (Mills v. Forestex Co. (2003) 108 Cal.App.4th 625, 641.)

As with all Plaintiff’s claims, however, Defendant’s challenges cannot be effectively applied until the FAC is cured of its ambiguity.

Leave to Amend

Plaintiff has only amended her pleading once. The gravamen of her claims is apparent (although they are not pled specifically enough to place Defendant on notice of their details). And she has pled facts that implicate the “discovery rule” to toll relevant limitations period (e.g., the recording of the 2023 Deed), even though she has not pled them with sufficient clarity.

The Court permits thirty (30) days’ leave to amend.

/ / /

Conclusion

The demurrer is sustained in its entirety as to defendant Jennifer Jaye Fraser in her individual capacity. Plaintiff is granted leave to file a second amended complaint within thirty (30) days, or the Court will dismiss with prejudice as to defendant Fraser only.