Judge: Steven A. Ellis, Case: 23STCV23600, Date: 2025-01-09 Tentative Ruling
Case Number: 23STCV23600 Hearing Date: January 9, 2025 Dept: 29
Hernandez v. Adventist Health White Memorial
23STCV23600
Demurrer to Complaint filed by Defendants Otis Elevator Company and Pacific
Coast Elevator Corporation.
Tentative
The demurrer is overruled.
Background
On January 19, 2024, Plaintiff amended the complaint to
name White Memorial Medical Center as Doe 1.
On February 2, 2024, Jones Lang LaSalle Americas, Inc.
(sued as Jones Lang LaSalle Securities LLC) (“JLL”) filed an answer to the
complaint.
On February 9, 2024, JLL filed a cross-complaint against
Otis Elevator Company, LLC and Roes 1 through 10.
On February 23, 2024, White Memorial Medical Center dba
Adventist Health White Memorial filed an answer to the complaint.
On July 3, 2024, JLL amended the cross-complaint to name
Pacific Coast Elevator Corporation dba AMTECH Elevator Services (“Pacific Coast”)
as Roe 1.
On July 5, 2024, Plaintiff amended the complaint to name
Otis Elevator Company (“Otis”) as Doe 2 and to name Pacific Coast as Doe 3.
On July 17, 2024, JLL filed a request to dismiss Otis Elevator
Company, LLC from the cross-complaint with prejudice.
On August 21, 2024, Pacific Coast filed an answer to the
cross-complaint.
On October 11, 2024, Otis and Pacific Coast (“Defendants”)
filed this demurrer to the complaint, along with a request for judicial
notice. Plaintiff filed an opposition to
the demurrer and an opposition to the request for judicial notice on November
22. Defendants filed a reply on December
2.
The demurrer was initially set for hearing on November
21, 2024 in Department 32. The parties
stipulated to continue the hearing to December 9. Following the closure of Department 32, the
hearing was reset for January 9, 2025, in Department 29.
Legal Standard
Demurrers
Code of Civil Procedure
section 430.10 provides:
“The party against whom a
complaint or cross-complaint has been filed may object, by demurrer or answer
as provided in Section 430.30, to the pleading on any one or more of the
following grounds:
(a) The court has no
jurisdiction of the subject of the cause of action alleged in the pleading.
(b) The person who
filed the pleading does not have the legal capacity to sue.
(c) There is another
action pending between the same parties on the same cause of action.
(d) There is a
defect or misjoinder of parties.
(e) The pleading
does not state facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action.
(f) The pleading is
uncertain. As used in this subdivision, “uncertain” includes ambiguous and
unintelligible.
(g) In an action
founded upon a contract, it cannot be ascertained from the pleading whether the
contract is written, is oral, or is implied by conduct.
(h) No certificate
was filed as required by Section 411.35.”
A general demurrer under Code
of Civil Procedure section 430.10, subdivision (e), tests whether the complaint
states a cause of action. (Hahn v. Mirda (2007) 147 Cal.App.4th 740, 747; see also 1
Weil & Brown, California Practice Guide: Civil Procedure Before Trial
[2024], ¶ 7:40.)
“We treat
the demurrer as admitting all material facts properly pleaded, but not
contentions, deductions or conclusions of fact or law. We also consider matters which may be
judicially noticed.” (Centinela
Freeman Emergency Medical Associates v. Health Net of California (2016) 1
Cal.5th 994, 1010; Blank v. Kirwan (1985) 39 Cal.3d 311, 318; accord Yvanova
v. New Century Mortgage Corp. (2016) 62 Cal.4th 919, 924; Marina Pacific
Hotel and Suites v. Fireman’s Fund Insurance Company (2022) 81 Cal.App.5th
96, 104.) All reasonable inferences must
be drawn in favor of the pleading. (Schifando
v. City of Los Angeles (2003) 31 Cal.4th 1074, 1081; Marina Pacific
Hotel and Suites, supra, 81 Cal.App.5th at p. 104.) Even “improbable” facts alleged in the
pleading must be accepted as true. (Marina
Pacific Hotel and Suites, supra, 81 Cal.App.5th at pp. 104-105.)
Courts
must “liberally construe the pleading” and “give the complaint a reasonable
interpretation, reading it as a whole and its parts in context.” (Id. at p. 105.)
A
complaint must contain a “statement of facts constituting the cause of action,
in ordinary and concise language.” (Code
Civ. Proc., § 425.10, subd. (a)(1); see also C.A. v. William S. Hart High
School Dist. (2012) 53 Cal.4th 861, 872 [“the complaint need only allege
facts sufficient to state a cause of action”].)
Ordinarily, a complaint “is sufficient if it alleges ultimate rather
than evidentiary facts.” (Doe v. City
of Los Angeles (2007) 42 Cal.4th 531, 550.)
Ultimate facts are those upon which “the right to recover depends” and
are “essential” to the cause of action. (Estes
v. Eaton Corp. (2020) 51 Cal.App.5th 636, 643 fn. 2; see also 1 Weil &
Brown, supra, ¶ 6:124.)
A
plaintiff is required to plead only “the essential facts of [its] case” that
are sufficient “to acquaint a defendant with the nature, source and extent of
[the] cause of action.” (Doe, supra, 42
Cal.4th at p. 550.) Mere boilerplate or
pleading of legal conclusions is not sufficient. (Id. at p. 551 fn. 5.) But a plaintiff need not allege “each
evidentiary fact that might eventually form part of plaintiff’s proof” at
trial. (C.A., supra, 53 Cal.4th at
p. 872.)
A demurrer can be sustained only when it disposes of an
entire cause of action. (Poizner v. Fremont General Corp. (2007) 148
Cal.App.4th 97, 119; Kong v. City of Hawaiian Gardens Redev. Agency
(2003) 108 Cal.App.4th 1028, 1046.)
Leave to amend should be
granted when “there is a reasonable possibility that the defect can be cured by
amendment.” (Centinela Freeman,
supra, 1 Cal.5th at p. 1010; Blank, supra, 39 Cal.3d at p. 318; Shaeffer
v. Califia Farms (2020) 44 Cal.App.5th 1125, 1145.)
Doe Pleading and
Code of Civil Procedure section 474
Code of Civil Procedure
section 474 provides, in relevant part:
“When the
plaintiff is ignorant of the name of a defendant, he must state that fact in
the complaint …, and such defendant may be designated in any pleading or
proceeding by any name, and when his true name is discovered, the pleading or
proceeding must be amended accordingly .…”
In general, an amendment to
a pleading to provide the true name of a Doe defendant relates back to the date
the pleading was filed; this allows a plaintiff, effectively, to extend or
enlarge the statute of limitations period. (Bernson v.
Browning-Ferris Industries (1994) 7 Cal.4th 926, 932.) For
a Doe amendment to relate back to the date of filing of the original complaint,
however, Plaintiff must have been genuinely ignorant of the defendant’s
identity at the time the original complaint was filed. (Woo v.
Super. Ct. (1999) 75 Cal.App.4th 169, 177.)
As the Court of Appeal has
explained, in determining whether a plaintiff is “ignorant of the name of a
defendant” under section 474:
“The test
is whether, at the time the complaint was filed, the plaintiff was ignorant of
the facts giving [her] a cause of against the person. The focus is on the fact that the plaintiff
knew, not on whether the plaintiff subjectively knew she had a cause of action
based on those facts. While the
plaintiff’s ignorance must be genuine, and the plaintiff cannot claim ignorance
simply because she did not know all the details of the person’s involvement,
the plaintiff is not barred from invoking section 474 merely because she
suspected the person of wrongdoing based on an incomplete set of facts.”
(Hahn v. New York Air
Brake LLC (2022) 77 Cal.App.5th 895, 899-900 [citations omitted]; see also,
e.g., McClatchy v. Coblentz, Patch, Duffy & Bass, LLP (2016) 247
Cal.App.4th 368, 374 [plaintiff must have “knowledge of sufficient facts to
cause a reasonable person to believe liability is probable”]; General Motors
Corp. v. Super. Ct. (1996) 48 Cal.App.4th 580, 585 [plaintiff may rely on
section 474 even if he has a “suspicion of wrongdoing” by defendant].)
The test is actual
ignorance. For purposes of section 474,
a plaintiff has no “duty to exercise reasonable diligence to obtain facts she
‘should have known.’” (Hahn, supra,
77 Cal.App.5th at p. 900; accord General Motors, 48 Cal.App.4th at pp.
594-596.)
Section 474 is to be
“liberally construed” in favor of the pleader.
(General Motors, 48 Cal.App.4th at p. 593 [collecting cases].)
The statute of limitations for a
personal injury action is two years. (Code Civ. Proc., § 335.1.)
Meet and Confer Requirement
Before filing a demurrer, the parties must meet and
confer. (Code Civ. Proc., § 430.41,
subd. (a).)
That requirement is satisfied here.
(Chic Decl., ¶ 10.)
Judicial Notice
Defendants
request that the Court take judicial notice of seven documents. The request is granted as to Exhibits A, B,
C, D, and E and denied as to Exhibits G and H.
(There is no Exhibit F.)
Four of the
documents (Exhibits A, B, C, and D) are documents from the Court’s file in this
action. A fifth (Exhibit E) is
information from the website of the office of the California Secretary of State. The request to take judicial notice of these five
documents is unopposed and is granted. The
Court takes judicial notice of the existence of these documents but does not,
however, accept as true all of the matters stated within. (See Cruz v.
County of Los Angeles (1985) 173 Cal.App.3d 1131, 1134.)
The two remaining
documents (Exhibits G and H) are letters between Plaintiff’s counsel Defendants
dated in January and February 2023.
Plaintiffs oppose the request to take judicial notice of these two
documents.
Defendants argue
that these materials are “not reasonably susceptible to dispute and are capable
of immediate and accurate determination by resort to sources of reasonably
indisputable accuracy” under Evidence Code section 452, subdivision (h) and/or
are “facts and propositions of generalized knowledge that are so universally
known that they cannot reasonably be the subject of dispute” under Evidence
Code section 451, subdivision (f). The
Court has reviewed the materials and the arguments of both sides and denies the
request to take judicial notice of Exhibits G and H. As the Court of Appeal has explained, “It is
true that a court may take judicial notice of a party's admissions or
concessions, but only in cases where the admission ‘can not reasonably be
controverted,’ such as in answers to interrogatories or requests for admission,
or in affidavits and declarations filed on the party's behalf.” (Arce
v. Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Inc. (2010) 181 Cal.App.4th 471, 485.)
Defendants may
(or may not) have a viable statute of limitations defense. Exhibits G and H may (or may not) be
admissible at trial, or in an evidence-based motion, such as a motion for
summary judgment. At this stage of the
proceedings, on demurrer (a pleading-based motion), however, the Court declines
to take judicial notice of these documents.
In these circumstances, Defendants cannot use judicial notice and Exhibits
G and H to prove, conclusively and as a matter of law, what Plaintiff knew and
when Plaintiff knew it. “The court will
take judicial notice of records such as admissions, answers to interrogatories,
affidavits, and the like, when considering a demurrer, only where they contain
statements of the plaintiff or his agent which are inconsistent with the allegations
of the pleading before the court. The hearing on demurrer may not be turned
into a contested evidentiary hearing through the guise of having the court take
judicial notice of affidavits, declarations, depositions, and other such
material which was filed on behalf of the adverse party and which purports to
contradict the allegations and contentions of the plaintiff.” (Del E. Webb
Corp. v. Structural Materials Co. (1981) 123 Cal.App.3d 593, 604-05.)
Discussion
Defendants demur
to the entire complaint, arguing that Plaintiff had actual knowledge of Defendants
prior to filing the complaint, and therefore the use of Doe pleading under Code
of Civil Procedure section 474 was improper and/or the claims asserted against
them do not relate back to the filing of the complaint. Without the benefit of the relation back
doctrine, Defendants argue, the causes of action asserted against them in the complaint
are time-barred.
On demurrer, the
Court may consider only the complaint and judicially noticeable materials. Here, Plaintiff alleges in the complaint that
the true names of Does 1 through 50 were (as of the time of filing) “unknown to
plaintiff.” The Court must accept that
allegation as true. Nothing in the
judicially noticeable materials is to the contrary. Accordingly, the demurrer based on Defendants’
statute of limitations defense is overruled.
Defendants also demur
on the ground that the complaint fails to state facts sufficient to state causes
of action against them. But here
Plaintiffs allege the ultimate facts that, if proven, would establish each of
the elements of his causes of action for negligence and premises
liability. The demurrer based on failure
to state sufficient facts is overruled.
Finally,
Defendants demur on the grounds on uncertainty.
Demurrers for uncertainty are
“disfavored” and will be sustained “only if the pleading is so incomprehensible
that a defendant cannot reasonably respond.”
(A.J. Fistes Corp. v. GDL Best Contractors (2019) 38 Cal.App.5th
677, 695.) A complaint need not be “a
model of clarity” and must only contain sufficient allegations to put the
defendants on notice of the claims against them. (Ibid.) As the Court of Appeal has observed, “where a
complaint is in some respects uncertain, … ambiguities can be clarified under
modern discovery procedures.” (Khoury
v. Maly’s of Cal., Inc. (1993) 14 Cal.App.4th 612, 616; see also 1 Weil
& Brown, supra, ¶¶7:85-7:86.)
Here, the complaint is not incomprehensible; Defendants can reasonably
respond. The demurrer on the grounds of
uncertainty is overruled.
Conclusion
The Court
OVERRULES the demurrer of Defendants Otis Elevator Company and Pacific Coast
Elevator Corporation.