Judge: Maurice A. Leiter, Case: 21STCV25666, Date: 2024-03-15 Tentative Ruling

Case Number: 21STCV25666    Hearing Date: March 15, 2024    Dept: 54

Superior Court of California 

County of Los Angeles  

Hearing Date: March 15, 2024

Department 54, Judge Maurice A. Leiter

Motion for Summary Judgment

Moving Party: Defendant City of Los Angeles

Responding Party: Peter Famulari

T/R:   DEFENDANT’S MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT IS GRANTED.

DEFENDANT TO NOTICE.

If the parties wish to submit on the tentative, please email the courtroom at¿SMCdept54@lacourt.org¿with notice to opposing counsel (or self-represented party) before 8:30 am on the day of the hearing.

            The Court considers the moving papers, opposition, and reply.

BACKGROUND 

Plaintiff Peter Famulari brought this lawsuit alleging damages resulting from restricted access to his property via Crater Lane.  The City of Los Angeles installed a large “END” sign in the middle of the road on the southern segment of Crater Lane.  The sign impaired access to Plaintiff’s property by car, and according to Plaintiff, rendered his property “landlocked” and substantially impacted its value. 

The operative First Amended Complaint alleges eight causes of action against the City for (1) public nuisance, (2) private nuisance, (3) inverse condemnation, (4) denial of due process, (5) dangerous condition of public property, (6) negligence, (7) declaratory relief, and (8) failure to repair dedicated street.  Plaintiff then filed a “supplemental” complaint for personal injury, based on alleged trip and falls while walking on Crater Lane. 

The Court bifurcated the First Amended Complaint’s third cause of action for inverse condemnation and seventh cause of action for declaratory relief.  Plaintiff’s claim for declaratory relief sought a declaration that the City owns and operates the relevant portion of Crater Lane and has a duty to maintain it.  These two claims proceeded to a bench trial on July 17, 2023. 

At the trial, Michael Patonai of the Bureau of Engineering, testified that he found no evidence of any act by the City Council or the City’s Board of Public Works accepting this portion of Crater Lane into the system of City streets.  (UMF No. 6,)  Mr. Patonai also testified that in his opinion, based on his knowledge, training and experience and review of records, the City has never accepted this portion of Crater Lane into the system of City streets.  (UMF No. 6.)  Mr. Patonai also testified the City does not maintain streets that have not been constructed per a City plan.  (UMF No. 7.)  Mr. Patonai testified that Crater Lane has no “Section ID” number in the Bureau of Engineering’s NavigateLA database which indicates that the City’s Bureau of Street Services does not consider it to be a street the City must maintain.  (UMF No. 8.) 

The City also introduced into evidence two letters from the mid-1960s by the then City Engineer of Los Angeles Lyall A. Pardee (Trial Exhibits 212 and 213), which support the testimony of Mr. Patonai that Crater Lane was not, and has never been, a City street.  (UMF No. 9.) 

On August 31, 2023, the Court issued its final decision on the inverse condemnation and declaratory relief claim.  The Court found that the portion of Crater Lane at issue in this case was not accepted to the City’s system of streets during the relevant period, as required by Streets and Highways Code §1806 and the City of Los Angeles has no duty to maintain it, or to remove the END sign and bollards.  (UMF No. 11.)   

Before the Court is the City’s motion for summary judgment.  The City argues that this Court’s August 31, 2023 decision found the City does not own, maintain, or control the disputed portion of Crater Lane because it was not accepted in the City’s system of streets during the relevant period, and this finding is dispositive of the remaining causes of action which require a showing that the City owns, maintains or controls the property at issue.   

LEGAL STANDARD  

The function of a motion for summary judgment or adjudication is to allow a determination as to whether an opposing party cannot show evidentiary support for a pleading or claim and to enable an order of summary dismissal without the need for trial.  (Aguilar v. Atlantic Ritchfield Co. (2001) 25 Cal.4th 826, 843.)  Code Civ. Proc. §437c(c) “requires the trial judge to grant summary judgment if all the evidence submitted and ‘all inferences reasonably deducible from the evidence’ and uncontradicted by other inferences or evidence, show that there is no triable issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” (Adler v. Minor Healthcare Corp. (1992) 7 Cal.App.4th 1110, 1119.)  “The function of the pleadings in a motion for summary judgment is to delimit the scope of the issues; the function of the affidavits or declarations is to disclose whether there is any triable issue of fact within the issues delimited by the pleadings.”  (Juge v. County of Sacramento (1993) 12 Cal.App.4th 59, 67).   

As to each claim as framed by the complaint, a defendant moving for summary judgment must satisfy the initial burden of proof by presenting facts to negate an essential element of the claim(s) or by establishing an affirmative defense.  (Code Civ. Proc. §437c(p)(2); Scalf v. D.B. Log Homes, Inc. (2005) 128 Cal.App.4th 1510, 1520.)  Courts “liberally construe the evidence in support of the party opposing summary judgment and resolve doubts concerning the evidence in favor of that party.”  (Dore v. Arnold Worldwide, Inc. (2006) 39 Cal.4th 384, 389.)  

Once the defendant has met its burden, the burden shifts to the plaintiff to show that a triable issue of one or more material facts exists as to that cause of action or a defense thereto.  (Id.)  To establish a triable issue of material fact, the party opposing the motion must produce substantial responsive evidence.  (Sangster v. Paetkau (1998) 68 Cal.App.4th 151, 166.)  

DISCUSSION 

The City argues that this Court’s August 31, 2023 ruling held that the City did not own, maintain, or control the relevant segment of Crater Lane. The City contends that this is dispositive of all remaining causes of action because these findings mean the City has no duty to maintain the END sign or the bollards.

Plaintiff does not dispute the premise of the City’s motion: that the City’s duty to maintain is a requirement for each of his remaining causes of action, and if the City did not own, control, or maintain the relevant section of Crater Lane, his remaining claims would be barred.  (See, e.g., Nalwa v. Cedar Fair, L.P. (2012) 55 Cal.4^th 1148, 1154 [“Duty, being a question of law, is particularly amenable to resolution by summary judgment.]) Plaintiff also does not dispute that this Court’s August 31, 2023 order found the City did not own, control or had a duty to maintain Crater Lane.  Plaintiff raises four arguments: 

First, Plaintiff argues that the Court’s findings are not final and are not binding.  This is incorrect.  “Issues adjudicated in earlier phases of a bifurcated trial are binding in later phases of that trial and need not be relitigated.  [Citations.]  No other rule is possible, or bifurcation of trial issues would create duplication, thus subverting the procedure’s goal of efficiency.  [Citation.]  ‘[D]uplication of effort is the very opposite of the purpose of bifurcated trials.’”  (Orange County Water Dist. v. Alcoa Global Fasteners, Inc. (2017) 12 Cal.App.5^th 252, 259.) 

Second, Plaintiff argues that the Court’s finding as to whether the City owned or controlled the street was not necessary to its decision and therefore may be revisited.  But Plaintiff’s claim for declaratory relief sought, among other things, a declaration that the City owned, operated and had a duty to maintain Crater Lane.  In finding for the City on this cause of action, the Court’s conclusion that the City did not own or control the relevant segment of Crater Lane was a necessary finding. 

Third, Plaintiff argues that the Court failed to consider City Ordinance 101780 and City Ordinance 186020 in the first phase of the trial.  As the City points out, these ordinances were not previously raised.  The pleadings play a key role in a summary judgment motion and “set the boundaries of the issues to be resolved at summary judgment.”  (Jacobs v. Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage Co. (2017) 14 Cal.App5th 438, 444.)  “A party may not oppose a summary judgment motion based on a claim, theory or defense that is not alleged in the pleadings,” and “evidence offered on an unpleaded claim, theory or defense is irrelevant because it is outside the scope of the pleadings.”  ¿(California Bank & Trust v. Lawlor¿(2013) 222 Cal.App.4th 625, 637, fn. 3.) 

Nor did Plaintiff seek to rely on these Ordinances at the bench trial. Plaintiff essentially asks the Court to reconsider its earlier ruling based on new arguments. The Court declines to do so.

Fourth, Plaintiff argues that the Court’s finding is limited to the period at issue in the claim for inverse condemnation and the Court did not address the 2020-2022 period.  Again, this argument ignores the Court’s finding on the declaratory relief claim.   

There is no triable issue as to the City’s ownership, control, or duty to maintain the relevant segment of Crater Lane. As noted, Plaintiff agrees that this finding precludes his remaining claims. The Court grants summary judgment in favor of the City.