Judge: Michael Small, Case: 24STCV10002, Date: 2025-04-03 Tentative Ruling

Inform the clerk if you submit on the tentative ruling. If moving and opposing parties submit, no appearance is necessary.

Case Number: 24STCV10002    Hearing Date: April 3, 2025    Dept: 57

The Court is sustaining with leave to amend the Defendants' demurrer to the claims for fraud and breach of contract in the Plaintiff's Second Amended Petition because attachments to the Petition -- namely, text messages and the sales agreement -- defeat the claims that  Defendants committed fraud and breached a contract. 

The Court also is sustaining with leave to amend Defendants' demurrer to the second claim for breach of fiduciary duty.  This claim rests on the notion that there is a valid trust in which Plaintiff is the designated beneficiary.  The problem is that the Second Amended Petition fails to identify the Plaintiff, or anyone else for that matter, as the beneficiary.   Nor does the trust itself, which is attached to the Second Amended Petition, identify any beneficiary.  This defect renders the trust invalid.

Because the trust is invalid, then it seems to follow that the Plaintiff cannot maintain this action.  That is because the action is brought by "The Jason Cheatham Estate Trust By And Throught Its Authorized Representative."   The authorized representative of a trust is a trustee.   The trustees of the alleged trust , the two individual Defendants, have not brought the action.  Plaintiff  does not allege he is a trustee.  A beneficiary can bring an action against trustees.  But as indicated above, neither in the Second Amended Petition nor in the trust itself is the Plaintiff identified as a beneficiary.