Judge: Michael E. Whitaker, Case: 23SMCV05437, Date: 2024-11-21 Tentative Ruling

Case Number: 23SMCV05437    Hearing Date: November 21, 2024    Dept: 207

TENTATIVE RULING

MOVING PAPERS:

1. Notice of Motion and Motion for Summary Judgment; Memorandum of Points and Authorities; Declaration of Diana Spielberger
2. Request for Judicial Notice
3. Separate Statement of Undisputed Material Facts
4. Appendix of Exhibits

OPPOSITION PAPERS:

1. Memorandum of Points and Authorities in Opposition to Motion for Summary Judgment
2. Declaration of Gilbert Luna
3. Declaration of Tina Abdolhosseini
4. Compendium of Evidence
5. Response to Separate Statement of Undisputed Material Facts

REPLY PAPERS:

1. Reply in Support of Motion for Summary Judgment
2. Objections to Evidence

BACKGROUND

On November 17, 2023, Plaintiff and Cross-Defendant Global Asset Recovery Management LLC (“Plaintiff”) brought suit, seeking $40,667 against Defendant and Cross-Complainant Residents Medical Group, Inc. dba Residents Medical (“Defendant”) stemming from two causes of action for (1) breach of contract and (2) common counts. 

Defendant now moves for summary judgment as to Plaintiff’s complaint.  Plaintiff opposes the motion and Defendant replies.

REQUEST FOR JUDICIAL NOTICE

Defendant requests judicial notice of the following:

Exhibit 1: Complaint filed on June 21, 2021 in Orange County Superior Court, case no. 30-2021-01207901-CU-BC_CJC, captioned RDI Financial LLC v. Residents Medical Group Incorporated

Exhibit 2: Request for Dismissal filed on October 1, 2021, in RDI Financial LLC v. Residents Medical Group Incorporated.

Exhibit 3: Substitution of Attorney form filed on October 8, 2021, in RDI Financial LLC v. Residents Medical Group Incorporated.

Exhibit 4: Complaint filed on February 1, 2023 in Orange County Superior Court, case no. 30-2023-013105554-CU-BC-CJC, captioned Global Assistance Recovery Management LLC v. Residents Medical Group, Inc. dba Residents Medical Group.

Exhibit 5: Tentative Ruling filed in Global Assistance Recovery Management LLC v. Residents Medical Group, Inc. dba Residents Medical Group

Judicial notice may be taken of records of any court in this state.  (Evid. Code, § 452, subd. (d)(1).)  Because the requested exhibits are part of the court records for the Orange County cases captioned RDI Financial LLC v. Residents Medical Group Incorporated and Global Assistance Recovery Management LLC v. Residents Medical Group, Inc. dba Residents Medical Group, the Court may take judicial notice of them.  (Ibid.)   However, “while courts are free to take judicial notice of the existence of each document in a court file, including the truth of results reached, they may not take judicial notice of the truth of hearsay statements in decisions and court files.  Courts may not take judicial notice of allegations in affidavits, declarations and probation reports in court records because such matters are reasonably subject to dispute and therefore require formal proof.”  (Lockley v. Law Office of Cantrell, Green, Pekich, Cruz & McCort (2001) 91 Cal.App.4th 875, 882 [cleaned up].) 

Accordingly, the Court takes judicial notice of the existence of the requested documents as court records, but not the truth of the allegations contained therein.

EVIDENTIARY OBJECTIONS

            The Court rules as follows with respect to Defendant’s evidentiary objections to the Luna declaration:

1.     Overruled

2.     Sustained

3.     Overruled

The Court rules as follows with respect to Defendant’s evidentiary objections to the Abdolhosseini Declaration:

1.     Overruled

2.     Overruled

3.     Overruled

4.     Overruled

LEGAL STANDARD – MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT

“[T]he party moving for summary judgment bears the burden of persuasion that there is no triable issue of material fact and that he is entitled to judgment as a matter of law[.] There is a triable issue of material fact if, and only if, the evidence would allow a reasonable trier of fact to find the underlying fact in favor of the party opposing the motion in accordance with the applicable standard of proof.”  (Aguilar v. Atlantic Richfield Co. (2001) 25 Cal.4th 826, 850.)  “[T]he party moving for summary judgment bears an initial burden of production to make a prima facie showing of the nonexistence of any triable issue of material fact; if he carries his burden of production, he causes a shift, and the opposing party is then subjected to a burden of production of his own to make a prima facie showing of the existence of a triable issue of material fact.”  (Ibid.)  

“On a summary judgment motion, the court must therefore consider what inferences favoring the opposing party a factfinder could reasonably draw from the evidence. While viewing the evidence in this manner, the court must bear in mind that its primary function is to identify issues rather than to determine issues.  Only when the inferences are indisputable may the court decide the issues as a matter of law. If the evidence is in conflict, the factual issues must be resolved by trial.”  (Binder v. Aetna Life Ins. Co. (1999) 75 Cal.App.4th 832, 839 [cleaned up].)  Further, “the trial court may not weigh the evidence in the manner of a factfinder to determine whose version is more likely true.  Nor may the trial court grant summary judgment based on the court's evaluation of credibility.”  (Id. at p. 840 [cleaned up]; see also Weiss v. People ex rel. Department of Transportation (2020) 9 Cal.5th 840, 864 [“Courts deciding motions for summary judgment or summary adjudication may not weigh the evidence but must instead view it in the light most favorable to the opposing party and draw all reasonable inferences in favor of that party”].) 

DISCUSSION

1.     DEFENDANT’S EVIDENCE

The contract attached to the Complaint is between a company called Interdependence and Defendant Residents Medical.  (See Ex. A to Complaint.)  Plaintiff brought suit to recover $40,667 as an assignee of Interdependence’s rights, title, and equity under the contract.  (Complaint at ¶ BC-1; BC-4.) 

Defendant contends that in response to discovery requesting evidence of the assignment of rights under the contract from Interdependence to Plaintiff, Plaintiff has produced only an assignment from Interdependence to a company called RDI Financial, LLC (“RDI”), which is a non-party to this litigation.  (UMF No. 4.)  Further, Defendant has responded to Special Interrogatory numbers 1 and 2 that it has no further facts supporting its contention that Interdependence’s rights under the contract were assigned to Plaintiff, other than the assignment from Interdependence to RDI it produced.  (UMF No. 5.)

Thus, Defendant has met its initial burdens of production and persuasion that Plaintiff will be unable to prove that it has standing to enforce rights under the contract as an assignee of Interdependence. 

2.     PLAINTIFF’S EVIDENCE

In Opposition, Plaintiff indicates that there are two additional assignments from Interdependence to Plaintiff, which Plaintiff inadvertently neglected to produce, but which Plaintiff has now produced, establishing Plaintiff’s standing as Interdependence’s assignee.  (Luna Decl. ¶¶ 3-7 and Exs. A-B; Abdolhosseini Decl. ¶¶ 3-7 and Ex. D.)

Defendant points out in reply that the assignment of the subject $40,667 debt from Interdependence to RDI is dated June 21, 2021 (Ex. 8), whereas the purported assignments of the same debt from Interdependence to Plaintiff are dated February 1, 2023 and November 17, 2023 (Exs. A-B to Luna Decl.)  

Defendant contends this is problematic because Interdependence no longer had the ability to assign the debt to Plaintiff it had already assigned two years prior to RDI.  Defendant also casts doubt on the credibility of the purported assignments, by virtue of the fact that the second, “confirmation” assignment is dated the same day Plaintiff filed the complaint in this action, and Plaintiff waited nearly three months after the MSJ was filed – until the eve of the opposition deadline – to supplement its production and interrogatory response.

With regard to Defendant’s credibility arguments, the Court cannot weigh the evidence or make credibility determinations on a motion for summary judgment. (Aguilar, supra, 25 Cal.4th. at p. 840  [“the trial court may not weigh the evidence in the manner of a factfinder to determine whose version is more likely true.  Nor may the trial court grant summary judgment based on the court's evaluation of credibility”].)

With regard to Defendant’s argument about the successive assignments of the same rights, the June 21, 2021 assignment to RDI provides:

Interdependence PR, whose address 1655 South Blue Island #355, Chicago, IL 60608 hereby sells, assigns, transfers, and set over to assignee of the record RDI Financial LLC whose address is 17595 Harvard Ave Ste C688 Irvine, CA 92614 all rights, title, and interest in the contract bay between Interdependence PR and Residents Medical Group, Inc. whose last knows [sic] address is 11766 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 405, Los Angeles, CA 90025 for the sum total of $40,667.00 RDI Financial LLC, who may take lawful means to enforce said contract.

            Similarly, the February 1, 2023 and November 17, 2023 assignments to Plaintiff provide:

Interdependence PR, whose address 1655 South Blue Island #355, Chicago, IL 60608 hereby sells, assigns, transfers, and set over to assignee of the record Global Asset Recovery Management, whose address is 17595 Harvard Ave Ste C-688 Irvine, CA 92614 all rights, title, and interest in the contract bay between Interdependence PR and Residents Medical Group, Inc. whose last knows [sic] address is 11766 Wilshire Boulevard, Suite 405, Los Angeles, CA 90025 for the sum total of $40,667.00 Global Asset Recovery Management, who may take lawful means to enforce said contract.

While the second and third assignments to Plaintiff may appear at first glance to be invalid by virtue of the first assignment to RDI, the Court notes that both RDI and Plaintiff appear to have the same address and suite number.  Further, the Court notes that it was Plaintiff who produced both the assignment to RDI and the two subsequent assignments to Plaintiff.  This is sufficient to create a factual dispute as to what, if any, relationship there is between Plaintiff and RDI that may give Plaintiff the right to enforce contractual rights assigned to RDI and/or which assignment(s) are valid.  As discussed above, the Court cannot weigh this competing evidence at the summary judgment stage.

CONCLUSION AND ORDER

Therefore, having found Plaintiff created a disputed issue of material fact as to the assignment of Interdependence’s contractual rights, the Court denies Defendant’s motion for summary judgment.

Defendant shall provide notice of the Court’s ruling and file the notice with a proof of service forthwith.   

DATED:  November 21, 2024                                               ___________________________

                                                                                          Michael E. Whitaker

                                                                                          Judge of the Superior Court