California Legal Brief

The Rule of Department of Human Resources v. California Correctional Peace Officers Association is that an arbitrator does not exceed their powers by issuing an award that offsets an SPB-approved disciplinary suspension when the award is based on violations of the Dills Act and MOU protections for union activity, under circumstances where the SPB reviewed the disciplinary action for cause under the Civil Service Act while the arbitrator separately reviewed whether the same discipline constituted unlawful retaliation for protected activities.

The Rule of Stoker v. Blue Origin is that an arbitration agreement containing multiple unconscionable provisions — including overbroad scope beyond employment, lack of mutuality favoring employer, predispute jury trial waiver, and blanket representative action waiver — cannot be enforced and severance is inappropriate where the defects indicate systematic effort to secure an unfairly advantageous forum, under circumstances where the employer imposed the adhesive agreement as a condition of employment.

The Rule of **Santana v. Studebaker Health Care Center** is that ambiguities in multiple arbitration-related documents signed simultaneously do not negate a valid agreement to arbitrate employment disputes where the parties' intent to arbitrate is clear from the overall terms, under circumstances where the documents contain minor conflicts regarding procedural matters like arbitrator selection but consistently reflect mutual agreement to resolve employment-related disputes through binding arbitration.

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 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 Jazmin Ayala-Ventura v. The Superior Court of Fresno County is that an employment arbitration agreement with potentially broad scope and indefinite duration is not substantively unconscionable when the employer's limited business operations restrict the realistic range of non-employment claims that could arise, under circumstances where the agreement provides mutual arbitration obligations, neutral arbitration procedures, and accessible dispute resolution terms.

The Rule of Fuentes v. Empire Nissan, Inc. is that a contract's format and illegibility generally do not support substantive unconscionability, but courts must closely scrutinize difficult-to-read contracts for unfair or one-sided terms when high procedural unconscionability exists, under circumstances where an employment arbitration agreement is presented in nearly illegible tiny print with minimal time for review.

The Rule of Sorokunov v. NetApp is that an arbitration award finding that a plaintiff did not suffer individual Labor Code violations can preclude the same plaintiff from claiming standing as an "aggrieved employee" in a PAGA action based on the identical violations, under circumstances where the plaintiff fully litigated the Labor Code violations in arbitration with a final award against them.

The Rule of Wright v. WellQuest Elk Grove, LLC is that an arbitration agreement clause stating "an arbitrator will decide any question about whether a claim or dispute must be arbitrated" does not clearly and unmistakably delegate threshold arbitrability issues (including unconscionability and enforceability) to the arbitrator, under circumstances where the language is silent as to interpretation and enforceability issues and lacks specificity about applicable arbitration rules.

The Rule of Vela v. Harbor Rail Services is that a railcar repairman who repairs decommissioned freight cars withdrawn from service at a railroad yard is not a "railroad employee" or "transportation worker" exempt from the Federal Arbitration Act, under circumstances where the worker is employed by an independent contractor company, has no direct employment relationship with the railroad, and performs repair work on rail cars that are temporarily out of service and not actively engaged in transporting goods.

The Rule of Robert Toothman v. Redwood Toxicology Laboratory, Inc. is that a nonsignatory employer cannot compel arbitration under a temporary employment agency's arbitration agreement when the employee's claims arise exclusively from direct employment with the nonsignatory employer that occurred after the agency employment ended, under circumstances where the arbitration agreement defines "Company" to include only the agency and its affiliates, subsidiaries and parent companies, and the claims do not arise out of or relate to employment with the temporary agency.