Judge: Mark A. Young, Case: 19STCV19756, Date: 2022-08-11 Tentative Ruling
Case Number: 19STCV19756 Hearing Date: August 11, 2022 Dept: M
CASE NAME: Shalgoun v. County of Los Angeles, et al.
CASE NO.: 19STCV19756
MOTION: Motions for New Trial and Reconsideration
HEARING DATE: 8/11/2022
Legal Standard
“A motion for new trial is a creature of statute; . . .” (Neal v. Montgomery Elevator Co. (1992) 7 Cal. App. 4th 1194, 1198.) A movant must satisfy Code of Civil Procedure sections 657 and 659. Under section 657, a motion for new trial may be granted if there is any:
[¶] 1. Irregularity in the proceedings of the court, jury, or adverse party, or any order of the court or abuse of discretion by which either party was prevented from having a fair trial. [¶] 2. Misconduct of the jury; and whenever any one or more of the jurors have been induced to assent to any general or special verdict, or to a finding on any question submitted to them by the court, by a resort to the determination of chance, such misconduct may be proved by the affidavit of any one of the jurors. [¶] 3. Accident or surprise, which ordinary prudence could not have guarded against. [¶] 4. Newly discovered evidence, material for the party making the application, which he could not, with reasonable diligence, have discovered and produced at the trial. [¶] 5. Excessive or inadequate damages. [¶] 6. Insufficiency of the evidence to justify the verdict or other decision, or the verdict or other decision is against law. [¶] 7. Error in law, occurring at the trial and excepted to by the party making the application.
(CCP, § 657.)
When ruling on an application for a new trial, the court sits as an independent trier of fact. (Lane v. Hughes Aircraft Co. (2000) 22 Cal.4th 405, 412.) The court, therefore, has broad discretion to order new trials, limited only by the obligation to state its reasons for granting a new trial and the existence of substantial evidence in the record to support those reasons. (Ibid.) In assessing the need for a new trial, the court must rely on its view of the overall record, taking into account such factors, among others, as the nature and seriousness of the alleged misconduct, the general atmosphere, including the judge’s control, of the trial, the likelihood of prejudicing the jury, and the efficacy of objection or admonition under all the circumstances. (Dominguez v. Pantalone (1989) 212 Cal.App.3d 201, 211.)
A new trial motion is not strictly limited to trials. For instance, a new trial motion is available to challenge a summary judgment. (Aguilar v. Atlantic Richfield Co. (2001) 25 Cal.4th 826, 858.) When a new trial is granted in such a case, the new trial motion is in the nature of a motion for reconsideration and subject to the same requirements (Id., fn. 29; see CCP § 1008(e) [“No application to reconsider any order or for the renewal of a previous motion may be considered by any judge or court unless made according to this section.”); Powell v. County of Orange (2011) 197 Cal.App.4th 1573, 1577 [“The name of a motion is not controlling, and, regardless of the name, a motion asking the trial court to decide the same matter previously ruled on is a motion for reconsideration under Code of Civil Procedure section 1008.”]; see also Passavanti v. Williams (1990) 225 Cal.App.3d 1602, 1606 [while a reconsideration motion filed after judgment was entered did not extend the time to appeal from the judgment, the appeal was nevertheless timely because the court treated the motion for reconsideration as one for new trial].)
The party intending to move for a new trial must file with the clerk and serve upon each adverse party a notice of his intention to move for a new trial, designating the grounds upon which the motion will be made and whether the same will be made upon affidavits or the minutes of the court or both, either (1) “after a decision is rendered and before the entry of judgment”; (2) “within 15 days of the date of mailing notice of entry of judgment by the clerk of the court . . . , or service upon him or her by any party of written notice of entry of judgment, or within 180 days after the entry of judgment, whichever is earliest”; or (3) if another party files the first motion for new trial, “each other party shall have 15 days after the service of that notice upon him or her to file and serve a notice of intention to move for a new trial.” (CCP § 659.) These time limits are jurisdictional and cannot extended or waived by stipulation nor court order. (Marriage of Herr (2009) 174 Cal.App.4th 1463, 1469 [while trial judge characterized order as one “granting reconsideration,” ruling effectively granted new trial and was untimely].)
A non-prevailing party may make a motion to reconsider and enter a different order under the following conditions: (1) brought before the same judge that made the order sought to be reconsidered; (2) made within 10 days after service upon the party of the notice of entry of the order (extended under CCP § 1013 for type of service); (3) based on new or different facts, circumstances or law than those before the court at the time of the original ruling; (4) supported by a declaration stating the previous order, by which judge it was made, and the new or different facts, circumstances or law claimed to exist; and (5) the motion must be made and decided before entry of judgment. (CCP, § 1008.)
The legislature intended to restrict motions for reconsideration to circumstances where a party offers the court some fact or circumstance not previously considered and some valid reason for not offering it earlier. (Gilberd v. AC Transit (1995) 32 Cal.App.4th 1494, 1500 [misinterpretation of the law is not a new or different matter].) Thus, “[t]o be entitled to reconsideration, a party should show that (1) evidence of new or different facts exist, and (2) the party has a satisfactory explanation for failing to produce such evidence at an earlier time.” (Mink v. Superior Court (1992) 2 Cal.App.4th 1338, 1342.) The moving party must demonstrate that such newly discovered evidence could not, with reasonable diligence, have previously discovered and produced. (Wilcox v. Ford (1988) 206 Cal.App.3d 1170.) The court may also reconsider its prior interim orders on its own motion to correct its own errors. (Le Francoise v. Goel (2005) 35 Cal.4th 1094, 1107-09.)
Analysis
Plaintiff requests that the Court reconsider its June 7, 2022, ruling granting summary judgment against Plaintiff and in favor of defendant North Los Angeles County Regional Center (NLACRC). Specifically, Plaintiff requests that the Court reconsider the request for leave to amend the operative complaint. Of note, the Court previously deemed the request immaterial, since the proffered amendments did not affect the legal question at issue in the motion for summary judgment. Plaintiff also requests that the Court reverse the June 7, 2022, ruling, or, alternatively, set the motion for a new hearing and allow supplemental briefing.
Regarding the reconsideration motion, the Court has no power to reconsider the motion for summary judgment after entry of judgment. Judgment was entered on June 20, 2022. Thus, the Court cannot consider the statutory motion for reconsideration under Code of Civil Procedure section 1008 directly. Instead, the new trial motion is the proper avenue for reconsideration. (Ten Eyck v. Industrial Forklifts (1989) 216 Cal.App.3d 540, 545 [court may not reconsider judgment; it may correct judicial error only through certain limited procedures such as motions for new trial and motions to vacate the judgment]; see Passavanti v. Williams (1990) 225 Cal.App.3d 1602.) Accordingly, the Court cannot grant reconsideration through section 1008 alone.
As to the new trial, Plaintiff relies on all seven possible grounds, even those that are plainly inapplicable to this procedural posture. Substantively, Plaintiff only proffers two arguments: 1) counsel had a family medical emergency that prevented her from fully presenting evidence to defeat the summary judgment motion; and 2) Plaintiff has the newly discovered evidence discussed in the reconsideration motion. Only the former is supported by reasoning or evidence. (See Doumanian Decl., passim [no mention of any emergency]; Shalgoun Decl., Ex. 1.) Thus, the Court will only entertain the following potential grounds for new trial on the basis of this “new” evidence: 1. Irregularity in the proceedings of the court, jury, or adverse party, or any order of the court or abuse of discretion by which either party was prevented from having a fair trial; 3. Accident or surprise, which ordinary prudence could not have guarded against; 4. Newly discovered evidence, material for the party making the application, which he could not, with reasonable diligence, have discovered and produced at the trial; 6. Insufficiency of the evidence to justify the verdict or other decision, or the verdict or other decision is against law; and 7. Error in law, occurring at the trial and excepted to by the party making the application. This is merely to point out that some grounds do not facially apply. The Court concludes that none of the grounds are met based on Plaintiff’s proffered new evidence.
Turning to the purported “new” evidence, Plaintiff argues that the admission agreement pertaining to NLACRC’s responsibilities regarding the care of (presumably) JC at the Hargis Home. (Shalgoun Decl., Ex. 1.) This agreement was attached as an exhibit in Opposition to Defendant’s summary judgment motion. (Shalgoun declaration (bates 00025-00027). In their motion, Plaintiff deceptively added pages to the Agreement, which were absent the original Exhibit I. Notably, Plaintiff directs the court to “pertinent provisions” which include Exhibit G ¶¶ 3, 8, 14, 16, and 20. Plaintiff specifically argues that these provisions somehow create a duty from NLACRC to Plaintiff regarding JC’s placement. Of course, Plaintiff only cites paragraphs in Plaintiff’s Exhibit I of the summary judgment record. Plaintiff cites no portion of the exhibit that Plaintiff contends was recently discovered. Plaintiff has thus demonstrated the only relevant portions of the proffered exhibit cannot be “new or different facts” that were not previously considered. Plaintiff has no valid reason for not offering these arguments earlier when the record already contained the relied-upon provisions, they were produced in discovery on November 21, 2021, and used by Plaintiff’s counsel at a deposition on May 13, 2022. Indeed, the Court can only conclude from this showing that Plaintiff’s counsel intends to deceive the Court in an effort to manufacture allegedly new or different facts.
NLACRC’s opposition to this motion sets out the falsity of Plaintiff’s counsel’s representations regarding when this document was received by counsel. As such, the Court will set an OSC re imposition of monetary sanctions against Plaintiff’s counsel, Nancy Doumanian, pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 128.5 for actions or tactics made in bad faith and that are frivolous. The hearing date on the OSC will be September 13, 2022 at 8:30 a.m. Any opposition shall be due by September 2, 2022.
For these reasons, the Court denies the motion for new trial motion based on the proffered “newly discovered” facts, which were already present on the summary judgment record. Accordingly, Plaintiff’s motion for new trial and reconsideration is DENIED.