California Legal Brief

The Rule of People v. Chang is that imperfect self-defense is unavailable when a defendant's belief in the need for self-defense is based entirely on delusion without any objective correlate that could plausibly relate to a reasonable need for self-defense, under circumstances where the defendant shoots at peace officers based solely on delusional beliefs about CIA persecution without any objective threatening conduct by the officers.

The Rule of West Contra Costa Unified School District is that a school district cannot claim impossibility as a defense to statutory teacher certification requirements until it has exhausted all statutory alternatives, including seeking waivers from the Commission on Teaching Credentialing or the State Board of Education, under circumstances where the district uses rolling substitutes instead of qualified permanent teachers in violation of statutory mandates.

The Rule of Aerni is that section 1940.1 does not require individualized proof that each class member used the hotel as their primary residence; rather, whether a hotel is "residential" is a hotel-wide inquiry based on the character and intended/actual use of the hotel as a whole, under circumstances where plaintiffs seek class certification for claims alleging the "28-day shuffle" practice at residential hotels.

The Rule of O'Leary v. Jones is that a party who obtains dismissal of a petition to confirm arbitration award on personal jurisdiction grounds is not a prevailing party under Civil Code section 1717 where the dismissal does not finally resolve the enforceability of the arbitration award and leaves the underlying contract dispute unresolved, under circumstances where the court expressly declines to rule on vacation of the award and the substantive claims may be pursued in another forum.

The Rule of Pechkis v. Trustees of the California State University is that an anti-SLAPP motion to strike entire causes of action fails when the defendant does not identify with specificity how each claim underlying the causes of action arises from protected activity, under circumstances where the causes of action contain both protected and unprotected conduct.

The Rule of Guardian Storage Centers, LLC is that attorneys must comply with State Fund obligations when they receive attorney-client privileged materials that were impermissibly taken from the privilege holder without authorization, even when the materials were originally sent to the disclosing person in their corporate capacity, under circumstances where the person later provides the materials to their attorney in their individual capacity against the privilege holder.

The Rule of Chi v. Department of Motor Vehicles is that a DMV hearing officer does not violate due process by introducing evidence and ruling on objections when acting as a neutral fact-finder rather than as an advocate, under circumstances where the DMV has expressly instructed hearing officers to act impartially and not advocate for the department.

The Rule of City of Fresno is that "great bodily injury" as used in Penal Code section 832.7(b)(1)(A)(ii) for California Public Records Act disclosure of law enforcement records means "a significant or substantial physical injury" as defined in Penal Code section 12022.7(f)(1), under circumstances where records relate to incidents involving use of force by police officers against persons.

The Rule of People v. Tzul is that a defendant's handwritten note found at a crime scene stating he found victims "having sex" and that this "fills me with rage" is admissible as circumstantial evidence of the defendant's state of mind for provocation defense, under circumstances where the statement about what defendant observed is not hearsay when offered to show defendant's belief rather than truth of the observation, and the statement about defendant's emotional reaction is admissible hearsay under Evidence Code section 1250's state-of-mind exception.

The Rule of People v. Tzul is that a handwritten statement found at a crime scene expressing the defendant's rage and belief about what victims were doing has significant probative value for provocation defense that cannot be substantially outweighed by prejudice concerns under Evidence Code section 352, under circumstances where the statement is the only evidence of provocation and is central to the defense theory.

The Rule of People v. Sanchez is that when a court corrects a clerical error in calculating prison time on an abstract of judgment, it lacks jurisdiction to modify other aspects of a final sentence absent specific statutory authorization, under circumstances where the original sentencing court properly sentenced defendant to separate felony prison terms and misdemeanor county jail terms but the abstract incorrectly included misdemeanor time in the total state prison calculation.

The Rule of People v. Perez is that police officers may not order a person out of a residence based solely on reasonable suspicion without probable cause and a warrant, even when the officers remain outside the residence, under circumstances where the person is seized while still inside the home.

The Rule of People v. Taft is that when calculating presentence custody credit for noncontinuous periods of custody, the total days of actual confinement must be aggregated first, and then matching conduct credit calculated on that total, under circumstances where a defendant served time before probation was granted and additional time after probation was violated.

The Rule of NNN Capital Fund I, LLC v. Mikles is that lack of standing is a jurisdictional defect that can be raised for the first time on appeal and requires vacation of an arbitration award and remand for factual determination of standing, under circumstances where purported liquidating trustees may not have been properly elected under the company's operating agreement.

The Rule of Sheerer v. Panas is that a trial court must include all bonus income and restricted stock units (RSUs) in calculating child support under the uniform statewide guideline formula, under circumstances where a parent receives such variable compensation and the court has not made proper findings to deviate from the presumptively correct guideline amount.

The Rule of Scott Meiner v. The Superior Court of Orange County is that an Apple Pay account constitutes a "financial account" for purposes of probation search limitations and must be excluded from warrantless probation searches when the probation terms expressly exclude "financial accounts," under circumstances where the probation terms specifically limit search authorization and do not extend to financial accounts.

The Rule of In re Marriage of Jenkins is that a default judgment in dissolution proceedings that awards specific property division relief exceeds the relief requested where the dissolution petition listed all property division issues as "To be determined," under circumstances where the defaulted party lacked proper notice of the prove-up hearing and the specific property division being sought.

The Rule of Leonardo Cordero v. Ghilotti Construction Company, Inc. is that Cal-OSHA regulations do not create nondelegable duties that preclude application of the Privette doctrine, and a hirer's site preparation activities do not constitute retained control over the contractor's work methods, under circumstances where the hirer hired an independent contractor to perform specific work and the contractor's employee was injured while performing that work.

The Rule of People v. Jones is that a defendant confined in jail in one county cannot willfully fail to appear for sentencing in another county, and the prosecution must prove a willful failure to appear with admissible evidence including certified court records, under circumstances where a defendant enters a Cruz waiver plea agreement.

The Rule of Clapkin v. Levin is that a cross-complaint does not arise from protected litigation activity under Code of Civil Procedure section 425.16 when the claims are based on the defendant's unprotected business conduct that supplies the elements of liability, even where the cross-complaint references prior litigation for context and evidence, under circumstances where the same dispute would exist absent the litigation activity.