Judge: Mark A. Young, Case: 20SMCV00916, Date: 2025-05-22 Tentative Ruling
Case Number: 20SMCV00916 Hearing Date: May 22, 2025 Dept: M
CASE NAME: Hirsh, et al.,
v. Gail, et al.
CASE NO.: 20SMCV00916
MOTION: Motion
for New Trial/Judgment Notwithstanding the Verdict
HEARING DATE: 5/22/2025
Legal
Standard
New Trial
“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 (CCP)
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.
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.)
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].)
JNOV
Code of Civil Procedure section 629 states that “[t]he
court, before the expiration of its power to rule on a motion for a new trial,
either of its own motion, after five days’ notice, or on motion of a party
against whom a verdict has been rendered, shall render judgment in favor of the
aggrieved party notwithstanding the verdict whenever a motion for a directed
verdict for the aggrieved party should have been granted had a previous motion
been made.”
¿
A JNOV motion ordinarily challenges whether the evidence
was sufficient to prove the claims or defenses asserted by the opposing party
and now embodied in the jury’s verdict. (Moore v. San Francisco (1970) 5
Cal.App.3d 728, 733-34; see Martin v. Ideal Packing Co. (1957) 156
Cal.App.2d 232, 235 [a JNOV motion is “in the nature of a demurrer to the
evidence”].) It thus has the same function as a motion for nonsuit or directed
verdict, the only difference being that the JNOV motion lies after a verdict
for the opposing party has been rendered. (Beavers v. Allstate Ins. Co.
(1990) 225 Cal.App.3d 310, 327.)
All evidence supporting the verdict is presumed true, so
the issue is whether the facts then constitute a prima facie case or defense as
a matter of law.¿ (Fountain Valley Chateau Blanc Homeowner's Ass’n v.
Department of Veterans Affairs (1998) 67 Cal.App.4th 743, 750.) “The court
may not weigh evidence, draw inferences contrary to the verdict, or assess the
credibility of witnesses. The court must deny the motion if there is any
substantial evidence to support the verdict.” (Begnal v. Canfield &
Assocs., Inc. (2000) 78 Cal.App.4th 66, 72.¿¿
¿
A JNOV motion is governed by the same rules that govern a
motion for directed verdict or nonsuit. (Hauter v. Zogarts (1975) 14
Cal.3d 104, 110.) Further, a JNOV motion “may be granted only if it appears
from the evidence, viewed in the light most favorable to the party securing the
verdict, that there is no substantial evidence in support.” (Sweatman v.
Department of Veterans Affairs (2001) 25 Cal.4th 62, 68.) A JNOV is proper
“only where, disregarding conflicting evidence on behalf of the defendants and
giving to plaintiff's evidence all the value to which it is legally entitled,
therein indulging in every legitimate inference which may be drawn from that
evidence, the result is a determination that there is no evidence of sufficient
substantiality to support a verdict in favor of the plaintiff.” (Reynolds v.
Wilson (1958) 51 Cal.2d 94, 99.)¿¿
The purpose of a JNOV motion “is to allow a party to
prevail as a matter of law where the relevant evidence is already in” and “to
prevent a miscarriage of justice in those cases where the verdict rendered is
without foundation.” (DLI Properties LLC v. Hill (2018) 29 Cal.App.5th
Supp. 1, 6; Sukoff v. Lemkin (1988) 202 Cal.App.3d 740, 743.) Nonetheless,
a trial court's discretion in granting a JNOV motion is severely limited.¿ (Garretson
v. Harold I. Miller (2002) 99 Cal.App.4th 563, 568.)
¿
A motion for JNOV must be decided by the trial court within
75 days after the clerk’s service of notice of entry of the judgment. (CCP §§
629(b), 659, 660(c).)
Analysis
Defendant/Cross-Complainant Leslie
Gail moves for a new trial and for judgment not-withstanding the verdict.
Preliminarily, Defendant failed to
file a memorandum in support of her JNOV motion. As to the JNOV motion, Defendant
only filed a notice which improperly included briefing. Despite this failure, the
Court will accept this briefing in the notice as Defendant’s memorandum on the
JNOV motion.
Both of her motions cover the same
substantive grounds. In both motions, Gail contends that Plaintiffs failed to
prove their claims with sufficient evidence as a matter of law, and that the Court
failed to determine the validity of the Statement of Interest. Defendant fails
to substantiate these arguments with any evidence or with sufficient citation
to the trial record. Defendant has not supplied any supporting declarations or
transcripts. Despite numerous unattributed quotations and claims of bias, Defendant
does not make a single citation to the trial record in either motion or her
reply. For example, Defendant repeatedly complains that the court
erroneously excluded expert testimony and failed to instruct the jury. (Mot. at
pp. 6-9, 13.) Defendant, however, never cites any particular rulings excluding
her expert’s testimony or rejecting a proffered jury instruction. Similar
defects run through her other contentions. Therefore, Defendant fails to
support any of her claims of irregularity (CCP § 657(1)), insufficiency
of the evidence (§ 657(6)) or error in law (§ 657(7)). The Court would also note that transcripts
provided by Plaintiff confirm that these contentions are factually incorrect.
Defendant also makes various legal
contentions. Each are unsupported by the law and facts. For example, Defendant
argues that the “short sale” without lender approval was per se illegal, citing
18 USC § 1344 and 12 USC § 2607. Defendant presented no evidence (and cites no
portion of the record) which supports the elements of those violations. Furthermore,
section 2607 does not apply to this transaction on its face, as this action
does not involve a real estate settlement service. Defendant cites no substantial
evidence, let alone conclusive evidence, that Plaintiff knowingly and intentionally
executed a scheme to defraud a financial institution in support of a violation
of section 1344.
Defendant further contends that the
Court improperly granted summary adjudication of an issue sua sponte. Again,
Defendant raises an issue without citation to the record. (Mot. pp. 13-14.) Simply
put, at no point did the Court summarily adjudicate an issue in this
action under section 437c.
Defendant contends that her prior
deposition testimony should not have been entered into evidence because such
statements were privileged under Civil Code section 47(b). Defendant lacks authority
supporting this proposition. To the contrary, section 47(b) is not an
evidentiary privilege. (Oren Royal Oaks Venture v. Greenberg, Bernhard,
Weiss & Karma, Inc., (1986) 42 Cal. 3d 1157, 1168.)
Finally, Defendant contends that
the Court improperly extinguished the easement without the issue being framed
by the pleadings. However, the Second Amended Complaint expressly requested a
declaration that “the Easement Agreement is no longer of any force or effect;
defendants may make no further use of the Easement; and record title to the
Plaintiff Property is free from the burden of the Easement . . ..” (SAC ¶ 30, Prayer,
¶ 2.)
Defendant’s contentions are without
merit. Accordingly, the motions are DENIED.