3/3/26
Court of Appeal, First Appellate District, Division Four
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.
April 2, 2026 (modified); January 14, 2026 (original)
Court of Appeal of the State of California, Fourth Appellate District, Division Two
The Rule of The Merchant of Tennis is that when putative class members rescind individual settlement agreements obtained through fraud or duress to join a class action lawsuit, they must be notified in the curative notice that they could be responsible for repayment of settlement consideration at the conclusion of litigation pursuant to Civil Code sections 1689, 1691, and 1693, under circumstances where an employer has obtained nearly 1,000 individual settlement agreements from employees during pending class certification proceedings through misrepresentations about the litigation.