Judge: Yolanda Orozco, Case: 21STCV42716, Date: 2022-08-09 Tentative Ruling
Case Number: 21STCV42716 Hearing Date: August 9, 2022 Dept: 31
MOTION FOR STAY OF PROCEEDINGS IS GRANTED
Background
On November 19, 2021, Plaintiff Darrius Bradford filed this representative action under the Private Attorney General Act (“PAGA”) on behalf of himself and other aggrieved employees of Defendant MUFG Union Bank, N.A. and Does 1 to 100.
In his Complaint, Plaintiff alleges he and other hourly
non-exempt aggrieved employees who worked remotely are owed back wages.
Defendant MUFG argues that this case is the fifth duplicative case asserted against it arising from claims under the PAGA. For this reason, Defendant moves to stay this action.
MUFG filed their Motion to Stay Proceeding on July 12, 2022. Plaintiff filed an Opposition on July 27, 2022. Defendant filed a reply on August 02, 2022.
Request for Judicial Notice
The Court may take judicial notice of records of any court of record of the United States. (Evid. Code § 452(d)(2).) However, the court may only judicially notice the existence of the record, not that its contents are the truth. (Sosinsky v. Grant (1992) 6 Cal.App.4th 1548, 1565.)
Defendant request Judicial Notice of the following:
1.
Exhibit A: a true and correct copy of the
putative class action First Amended Complaint for the matter of Cynthia
Garcia-Espinoza v. MUFG Union Bank N.A. and DOES 1-50, designated Case No.
56-2017-00492522-CU-OE-VITA, which was filed in Orange County Superior Court on
February 1, 2017.
2.
Exhibit B: a true and correct copy of the
putative class action Complaint for the matter of Tiffiany Morrell v. MUFG
Union Bank, N.A.; and DOES 1 to 20, designated Case No. 20STCV15084, which
was filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court on April 17, 2020.
3.
Exhibit C: a true and correct copy of the
representative action Complaint for the matter of Jozette D. Taylor v. MUFG
Union Bank, N.A. and DOES 1 through 50, designated Case No. 21STCV27530,
which was filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court on July 27, 2021.
4. Exhibit D: a true and correct copy of the representative action Complaint for the matter of Vivian Ortiz v. Union Bank, N.A.; MUFG Union Bank, N.A.; and DOES 1 through 100, designated Case No. 21AHCV00052, which was filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court on October 25, 2021.
Defendant’s Request for Judicial Notice is GRANTED.
Discussion
Plaintiff argues that this instant action is different from Garcia-Espinoza, Morrell, Taylor, and Ortiz because this action represents employees aggrieved by Defendant’s remote worker policy. Plaintiff also alleges that Defendant failed to indemnify aggrieved employees who worked remotely by requiring them to use or purchase their own tools and/or resources.
Defendant argues this case should be stayed under the doctrine of abatement or the rule of exclusive concurrent jurisdiction.
To assess the motion on the merits, the Court must determine whether the previously filed PAGA cases (Garcia-Espinoza, Morrell, and Taylor) wholly subsume Plaintiff’s current action such that a judgment in the other actions will bind the parties in this instant action. Defendant asserts that the Garcia-Espinoza, Morrell, Taylor, and Ortiz cases assert all of Plaintiff’s PAGA allegations and arise from the same labor code violations. (Mot. at p. 7 and p. 8.) Moreover, Plaintiff's causes of action are the same because Plaintiff is asserting a claim under PAGA. The Parties are also the same because the case involves the same Defendant and the same real party in interest, the State of California. (See Viking River Cruises, Inc. v. Moriana (2022) 142 S.Ct. 1906, 1914 [As the California courts conceive of it, the State “is always the real party in interest in the suit.”, citing Iskanian v. CLS Transportation Los Angeles, LLC (2014) 59 Cal.4th 348, 387.].)
The Court agrees that Plaintiff’s PAGA claim may be
subsumed by the other pending actions.
a. PAGA Does
Not Prohibit Overlapping PAGA Cases
Defendants assert that “[b]ecause an aggrieved employee's action under the Labor Code
Private Attorneys General Act of 2004 functions as a substitute for an action
brought by the government itself, a judgment in that action binds all those,
including nonparty aggrieved employees, who would be bound by a judgment in an
action brought by the government.” (Arias
v. Superior Court (2009) 46 Cal.4th
969, 986.)
However,
PAGA expressly
provides that employees retain all rights “to pursue or recover other remedies available
under state or federal law, either separately or concurrently with an action
taken under this part.” (Cal. Lab. Code, § 2699(g)(1).) Further,
existing case law establishes that overlapping PAGA cases brought by different
PAGA representatives is not per se prohibited. (See Julian v. Glenair, Inc. (2017) 17 Cal.App.5th 853, 866-867, 873 [stating PAGA
“permits the state - through the LWDA - to designate more than one employee to
act as its agent in its dispute with a particular employer”]; see also Gonzales
v. CoreCivic of Tennessee, LLC (E.D. Cal.) 2018 WL 3689564, * 4 [comparing PAGA to
California's False Claim Act and rejecting “first-to-file” argument in PAGA
action in light of statutory language].)
Nevertheless, this Court is not prevented
from staying or abating a case pending the completion of another related case,
regardless of whether they are overlapping PAGA claims brought by different
representatives. (See, e.g., Alakozai v. Chase Inv. Servs. Corp.
(C.D. Cal.) 2012 WL 748584 [“allowing the two matters to proceed simultaneously
would unnecessarily risk inconsistent judgments and defeat
efficiency”].)
b.
Abatement pursuant to CCP Section 597
“Where the cause of abatement is the pendency of another lawsuit on the same cause of action, the statute prescribing entry of an interlocutory judgment suspending proceedings until the final determination of the other action permits the trial court to retain jurisdiction over the subsequent action.” (See County of Santa Clara v. Escobar (2016) 244 Cal.App.4th 555, 565, referencing Cal. Civ. Proc. Code, § 597.)
“The purpose of the interlocutory judgment ... is to permit the trial court to retain jurisdiction over the subsequent action so that when a final determination is had in the prior pending action the court will be empowered to determine the issues in the subsequent suit. If a judgment upon the merits is rendered in the suit first commenced, the party asserting the plea in abatement should be granted leave to amend to plead the res judicata effect of the judgment in bar of the subsequent action. But if, as in the present case, the prior litigation is not determined upon the merits, the trial court should hear and decide the rights of the parties in accordance with the issues presented by the pleadings in the second action.” (Lord v. Garland (1946) 27 Cal.2d 840, 851.)
Therefore, if the prior action remains undetermined and has not been decided on the merits, the only relief available is abatement. (Id. [“The only relief to which a litigant is entitled upon the plea, by either demurrer or answer, that a prior action between the same parties is pending and undetermined is the judgment specified by section 597, Code of Civil Procedure, that the second action abate.”].) “A plea in abatement is essentially a request— not that an action be terminated—but that it be continued until such time as there has been a disposition of the first action.” (Lawyers Title Ins. Corp. v. Superior Court (1984) 151 Cal.App.3d 455, 459.)
The defendant must show that the parties, cause of action, and issues are identical, and the same evidence would support the judgment in each case. (California Union Ins. Co. v. Trinity River Land Co. (1980) 105 Cal.App.3d 104, 108.)
Here, Defendant has shown that Plaintiff’s PAGA claim involves the same parties, asserts the same labor code violations, and covers the same periods of employment. The Court is not convinced that Plaintiff’s PAGA action covers different employees and circumstances - workers who worked remotely and were aggrieved by Defendant’s remote worker policy. Nor has Plaintiff presented evidence to support the contention that the issues and evidence involved in this instant action are sufficiently different such that any judgments in the prior actions will not bar recovery in this action.
Therefore, the Court agrees that this action should be stayed pending resolution of the four pending actions.
c.
Rule of Exclusive Concurrent Jurisdiction
“Under the rule of exclusive concurrent jurisdiction, ‘when
two superior courts have concurrent jurisdiction over the subject matter and
all parties involved in litigation, the first to assume jurisdiction has
exclusive and continuing jurisdiction over the subject matter and all parties
involved until such time as all necessarily related matters have been
resolved.’” (Plant Insulation Co. v.
Fibreboard Corp. (1990) 224 Cal.App.3d 781, 786–787, quoting California
Union Ins. Co. v. Trinity River Land Co. (1980) 105 Cal.App.3d 104, 109.) “The rule is based upon the public policies
of avoiding conflicts that might arise between courts if they were free to make
contradictory decisions or awards relating to the same controversy, and
preventing vexatious litigation and multiplicity of suits.” (Plant Insulation Co., supra, 224
Cal.App.3d at 787.)
“The rule of exclusive
concurrent jurisdiction may constitute a ground for abatement of the subsequent
action.” (Id. at 787.) “Unlike the statutory plea of abatement, the rule
of exclusive concurrent jurisdiction does not require absolute identity of
parties, causes of action or remedies sought in the initial and subsequent actions.”
(Id. at 788.) “An order of abatement issues as a matter of right not as
a matter of discretion where the conditions for its issuance exist.” (Id.
at p. 787.)
In Shaw
v. Superior Court of Contra Costa County (2022),
the Appeal Court found that a court has the “power to stay a subsequent PAGA representative suit that is wholly subsumed by
a prior PAGA representative suit—i.e., where the second suit alleges the
same Labor Code violations based on the same facts and theories as the prior
suit[.]” (78 Cal.App.5th 245, 260.) “While
the Legislature sought to maximize code enforcement and deter future
violations, we do not discern an intent in PAGA to waste judicial resources,
encourage a multiplicity of duplicative suits, and prohibit courts from staying
suits that might otherwise lead to inconsistent results. PAGA and the exclusive
concurrent jurisdiction rule can rationally coexist, and so they must.” (Id.
at 260.)
The Court finds that Plaintiff’s PAGA claim is subsumed by four prior actions, Garcia-Espinoza, Morrell, Taylor, and Ortiz. All four actions are being heard by other courts or other departments. As such, the Court agrees that the rule of exclusive concurrent jurisdiction applies, and this action should be stayed.
Conclusion
Defendant MUFG’s Motion to Stay Proceedings is GRANTED. A Status Conference is set on January 12, 2023, at 9 a.m.
Moving Party to give notice.
The
parties are strongly encouraged to attend all scheduled hearings virtually or
by audio. Effective July 20, 2020, all matters will be scheduled virtually
and/or with audio through the Court’s LACourtConnect technology. The parties
are strongly encouraged to use LACourtConnect for all their matters. All
protocols will be observed at the Courthouse and in the courtrooms.