1DCA Division 1 Oral Argument - 2025/12/02 - Dec 02, 2025

argument

1DCA Division 1 Oral Argument - 2025/12/02

California First District Court of Appeal 2h 22m 8 chapters transcribed 6 days ago official recording ↗

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Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.

What does the court address at the very beginning of the oral argument?

Unknown 0:01

Good morning, everybody sit down. And uh are we up and running this morning? Yeah.

Unknown 0:33

Okay. All right, for uh the good news is for the first three cases, there's all personal appearances, so the issues with the television screens don't need to concern us initially. Apparently the lights are suddenly going out. Occasionally. Don't get nervous, they'll come back on. And um That we we've been having these um electronic goblins around here for about the last week and a half. So I don't none of us really know exactly what's going on, but we're all functional, so that's great. All right, calling the first matter that we're gonna hear this morning is um Shannon B. Jones Law Group versus Sandra Andrade. Council, you want to state your appearances, please? Good morning, all these justice is Richard Bowles also burned for these comments.

Unknown 1:24

Thank you.

Unknown 1:31

Thank you. Okay. Um well this is uh Part of a wage an hour case and it uh raises a rather interesting issue about a cross complaint against an employee who allegedly failed to accurately report the hours work. So do you wanna Go ahead and focus on I can assure you we You know, done all the briefing, we have a draft opinion, we're up to speed on the issues here, so you can focus on the main points. Thank you, Your Honor. If I may, I'd like to start with the motion for leave to amend because I think it is the most obvious and straightforward. It's a two-part issue before you, both the motion for leave to amend and the motion for summary judgment. The motion for leave to amend and the tentative, the judge in the Superior Court went through great length to point out why it had taken so long.

Unknown 2:25

To get this motion filed. And she concluded that because of all the stipulations, because of the fact that it related to another related case, and because of the COVID issues, that the five-year delay was not unreasonable and not something that should be uh viewed as a problem for the m approving the motion. When it came time for the tennis came time for the hearing She abruptly changed and simply said, Oh, five years is too long, notwithstanding the fact that she'd gone through the whole process and said, No, it's not. So we take the position that number one, that determination was incorrect because it was not too long, and there was all kinds of reason why it took that long. And there's an estoppel argument because there were stipulations signed by all the parties in council.

Unknown 3:15

Court signed stipulation. What were the stipulations? Stipulations were to continue the hearing because it related to the other main case. But but none of that prohibited. True leave to amend true opportunities, absolutely not. And we have years. Of inaction. And then right before the summary judgment Hearing is to occur. Is this request? Yes, sir. What is the trial court supposed to do with that? Well, it d what exactly what it did in the tentative, and that is recognize why there was no urgency to getting it done within that time period. It's it's very uh similar to the uh case that came out of Contra Costa County uh involving Ceno that we cited to you, where again, just before the summary judgment hearing, the motion was made to amend.

Unknown 4:01

Trial court denied, Court of Appeal reversed and said, Oh, even even at that point, it is still appropriate to go ahead and amend and allow amendment. But but is isn't this an area where the trial court has some discretion? Yes it is. Yes it is. But that's only one part of the issue. Okay. The law is very clear that even with delay, unless there's a finding of prejudice, you still have to allow the amendment. Delay by itself. Is sufficient? Don't think so, sir. I think it has to there has to be prejudice shown also. And the pre there was absolutely no finding of prejudice here whatsoever. The court just completely, after having in the tentative said no prejudice, in in the ruling said just ignored the issue of prejudice.

Unknown 4:47

Just went right past it and no no such finding. So then moving on to the motion for summary judgment. The motion for summary judgment in our view uh again but