Judge: Malcolm Mackey, Case: 21STCV39406, Date: 2023-04-18 Tentative Ruling


Case Number: 21STCV39406    Hearing Date: April 18, 2023    Dept: 55

CARRADINE v. DEWITTE                                                           21STCV39406

Hearing Date:  4/18/23,  Dept. 55

#11:   MOTION FOR JUDGMENT ON THE PLEADINGS.

 

Notice:  Okay

Opposition

 

MP:  Plaintiff/Cross-Defendant.

RP:  Defendants/Cross-Complainants DE WITTE MORTGAGE INVESTORS 2 FUND, LLC, CLE CAPITAL PARTNERS, LLC and PETER DE WITTE.

 

 

Summary

 

On 10/26/21, Plaintiff SANDRA WILL CARRADINE, a self-represented litigant, filed a Complaint.

On 3/10/22, Plaintiff filed a First Amended Complaint, alleging:  For years, defendants have been trying to drive Plaintiff out of her leased premises, including by fraud.  Plaintiff successfully obtained summary judgment in an unlawful detainer action, based upon having a lease with an option to purchase, at 2115 N. Upper Krest St., Los Angeles, CA 90046.  Defendant DEWITTE MORTGAGE INVESTORS FUND, LLC (DMIF) had foreclosed on a second deed of trust. Also, Defendant PETER DEWITTE recorded an assignment of a deed of trust to himself, and seeks to foreclose on the extinguished first deed of trust, using CLE CAPITAL PARTNERS LLC (CLE) as a strawman.

The causes of action are:

1.      FRAUD.

2.      VIOLATION OF ANTI-HARASSMENT ORDINANCE.

3.      BREACH OF THE IMPLIED COVENANT OF GOOD FAITH AND FAIR DEALING.

4.      TORTIOUS INTERFERENCE WITH CONTRACT.

 

On 3/3/22, defendants DE WITTE MORTGAGE INVESTORS FUND LLC and PETER DE WITTE filed a Cross-Complaint against Plaintiff and others, alleging that cross-defendants made publications including a lis pendens against the property, which casts doubts on the propriety of cross-complainants’ claims to title in the Property.

Cross-complainants’ Causes of Action are:

1. SLANDER OF TITLE;

2. INTENTIONAL INTERFERENCE WITH ECONOMIC RELATIONS;

3. NEGLIGENT INTERFERENCE WITH ECONOMIC RELATIONS;

4. DECLARATORY RELIEF;

5. EJECTMENT;

6. FRAUDULENT INTENTIONAL MISREPRESENTATION; AND

7. NEGLIGENT MISREPRESENTATION.

 

 

MP Positions

 

Moving party requests an order granting judgment on the pleadings on the First Amended Complaint, and against the First Amended Answer, on grounds including the following:

 

·         Plaintiff’s Complaint sufficiently alleges the causes of action.

·         The Unlawful Detainer action is collateral estoppel or claim preclusion.

·         Defendants’ motion for expunging the lis pendens was denied.

·         The amended answer fails to allege sufficient, ultimate facts.

·         The amended answer fails to specify causes of action each affirmative defense relates to.  Buhne Corbett (1872)  43 C. 264.

 

 

RP Positions

 

Opposing parties advocate denying, on bases including the following:

 

·         Defendants  more than adequately stated facts sufficient to constitute a defense.

·         Defendants' First Affirmative Defense sufficiently alleges that  the evidence will prove that the parties to such purported lease had no authority to enter into said lease, the lease would be invalid.

·         The other affirmative defenses similarly are valid, including allegations that Plaintiff interfered with the property sale, Plaintiff failed to pay rent in support of the purported lease, and defendants justifiably believed records from the predecessor-in-interest.

·         The motion is essentially identical to the original motion ordered off calendar, and does not address the facts as contained in the First Amended Answer.

 

 

Tentative Ruling

 

The motion for judgment on the pleadings  is denied.

Complainants may move for judgment on the pleadings on the ground that complaints state sufficient facts to constitute causes of action, but defendants’ answers do not state facts sufficient to constitute a defense to the complaint, in which case judges assume that the answers could be proved, and decide whether the pleading raises issues resolvable as matters of law.  Alameda Cnty. Waste Mgmt. Auth. v. Waste Connections US, Inc. (2021) 67 Cal. App. 5th 1162, 1174.

An answer must aver facts as carefully as is required for complaints.  FPI Dev., Inc. v. Nakashima (1991) 231 Cal.App.3d 367; 384.  “Affirmative defenses must not be pled as ‘terse legal conclusions,’…” but rather as facts averred in as much detail as is required in complaints.  In re Quantification Settlement Agreement Cases (2011) 201 Cal.App.4th 758, 813.  However, the difference between conclusions and ultimate facts is not clear, but involves matters of degree, and a determination whether the complaint apprises defendants of the bases.  Doheny Park Terrace Homeowners Assn., Inc. v. Truck Ins. Exch. (2005) 132 Cal. App. 4th 1076, 1099 (citing, e.g.,  Perkins v. Sup. Ct. (1981) 117 Cal. App. 3d 1, 6).  “‘[U]ltimate fact’ is a slippery term, but in general it refers to a core fact, such as an element of a claim or defense, without which the claim or defense must fail.”  Yield Dynamics, Inc. v. Tea Systems Corp.  (2007) 154 Cal.App.4th 547, 558.

Here, there is no pure issue of law existing as to the pleadings.  Instead, defendants’ First Amended Answer, like the Cross-Complaint, sufficiently and factually alleges that Plaintiff entered into a sham lease, and made false statements, as part of a conspiracy to interfere with the property’s sale, and defendants justifiably relied on documentation from predecessors-in-interest.

Further, defendants’ allegations are not barred via judicial notice. 

First, the bases for the underlying unlawful detainer action are unclearly stated in the judgment, such that it is not clear that there is a bar as to the issue of lease validity.  "If 'anything is left to conjecture as to what was necessarily involved and decided' there can be no collateral estoppel....” Dunkin v. Boskey (2000) 82 Cal. App. 4th 171, 181.  Accord  Bronco Wine Co. v. Frank A. Logoluso Farms  (1989) 214 Cal.App.3d 699, 709;  Southwell v. Mallery (1987) 194 Cal. App. 3d 140, 144.  Parties asserting collateral estoppel have the heavy burden to establish the threshold requirements.  People v. Garcia (2006) 39 Cal. 4th 1070, 1092.  “[T]he facts underlying the applicability of the res judicata defense are tried to the court, and not to a jury,…”  Windsor Square Homeowners Assn. v. Citation Homes (1997) 54 Cal.App.4th 547, 557. 

Second, the underlying Cross-Complaint, and Judgment finding against the lease, did not include Plaintiff herein as a party, and privity of the parties is unclear from evidence submitted, such that any bar is not established.  Privity includes relationships between parties to be estopped, and parties in prior litigation, which are sufficiently close, in having an identity of interests with, and adequate representation by, parties to the prior action, and circumstances indicating that parties to be estopped reasonably should have expected to be bound.  Johnson v. Glaxosmithkline (2008) 166 Cal.App.4th 1497, 1510-11. 

Finally, moving party’s requests for judicial notice are granted only as to the existence of court documents, but denied as to the statements therein.  Judges may take judicial notice of the existence of court documents, “but cannot take judicial notice of the truth of hearsay statements in decisions or court files, including pleadings, affidavits, testimony, or statements of fact.”  Williams v. Wraxall (1995) 33 Cal. App. 4th 120, 130 n. 7.  Courts cannot take judicial notice of a judge's findings unless the requirements of res judicata or collateral estoppel must apply pursuant to a final judgment.  Plumley v. Mockett (2008) 164 Cal.App.4th 1031, 1051;  O'Neill v. Novartis Consumer Health, Inc.  (2007) 147 Cal.App.4th 1388, 1405;  Kilroy v. State of Cal. (2004) 119 Cal. App. 4th 140, 148; Columbia Cas. Co. v. Northwestern Nat. Ins. Co. (1991) 231 Cal. App. 3d 457, 473;  Sosinsky v.  Grant (1992) 6 Cal.App.4th 1548, 1568-69.