Government Liability Update

School District Complaint Form Did Not Substantially Comply with Claim Requirements and Did Not Serve as a Claim as Presented; No Equitable Estoppel Where Claimant Obtains Counsel within Time to Seek Late-Claim Relief

In A.S. v. Palmdale School District, published August 28, 2023, the Second District Court of Appeal, Division 8 affirmed dismissal of a personal injury suit against a school on demurrer.  On March 5, 2019, an elementary school teacher allegedly grabbed the minor plaintiff's arm and twisted it, resulting in an injury.  The next day, the plaintiff's mother went to the school to file a complaint.  The receptionist told her to go to the school district.  She went to the district office.  The receptionist told the mother that the assistant superintendent had instructed her to give the mother a form entitled "Complaint Form--Employee Student Issue."  The mother asked if there were any other forms she needed to complete.  The receptionist said the assistant superintendent had only instructed her to provide that form.  The mother took the form home and completed it.  In the form, she described the incident, her son's injury, and the medical treatment.  She complained about the school's investigation, and alleged the principal was biased.  She suggested that a thorough district level, unbiased investigation be conducted, and that the teacher receive discipline.  She returned, gave the form to the assistant superintendent, and asked if there were any other documents or paperwork to complete.  He said there were none, and promised a full inquiry would be made and he would be in touch with her.  On February 25, 2020, the minor, now represented by counsel, filed suit.  He alleged that he had complied with the Government Claims Act, and attached a copy of the school complaint as an exhibit to the complaint.  The district demurred three times to the complaint, on the ground that the plaintiff did not comply with the Government Claims Act.  The first two demurrers were sustained with leave.  The third was sustained without leave, and the action was dismissed.

The appellate court ruled that the demurrer was properly sustained.  The school complaint form did not substantially comply with the claims requirement.  A document does not substantially comply with the claims requirement where it entirely omits a claim element required by Government Code section 910.  Under section 910, the claim must show the amount claimed if under $10,000; and if over $10,000 shall indicate whether the claim would be a limited civil case.  The form specified several administrative actions the plaintiff wanted the district to take, but did not state he was seeking monetary damages and made no attempt to estimate the amount of damages or state whether the claim would be a limited case.  It therefore did not substantially comply with the claim requirements.  The district did not waive noncompliance as an affirmative defense by failing to serve a Notice of Noncompliance under Government Code section 910.8.  A public entity must serve such a notice to object to a deficiency in a document that serves as a "claim as presented."  The most important element of a "claim as presented" is that it discloses the existence of a claim against the defendant that, if not satisfied, will result in litigation.  The complaint form here in no way suggested he was seeking compensation or was threatening litigation.  The court rejected the plaintiff's contention that the district was equitably estopped from asserting noncompliance because the assistant superintendent represented that the complaint form was the only form needed.  Even if those statements could have estopped the district while the claimant was unrepresented,  the law recognizes that circumstances may change and render estoppel no longer appropriate.  Here, the claimant obtained counsel and filed suit within the time to apply to the district for leave to present a late claim. The counsel was charged with knowledge of the law in California, including the Government Claims Act.  Further, the allegations of the complaint showed that the counsel was actually aware of the claim presentation requirement.  The plaintiff was charged with his attorney's knowledge of the claim presentation requirement.  He therefore could not satisfy the ignorance or reliance elements of equitable estoppel.  Although the record did not show the exact date the attorney was retained, he filed the suit within one year of the incident, showing that the claimant knew of the claim requirement within the one-year period to apply for leave to present a late claim.

City Did Not Waive Claim Timeliness by Offering Rate Refund Program

In Daneshmand v. City of San Juan Capistrano, ordered published February 16, 2021, the Fourth District Court of Appeal, Division 3 affirmed judgment in favor of the defendant city.  In a prior lawsuit, the trial and appellate court ruled that tiered water rates in effect February 1, 2010 through June 30, 2014 were not proportional to the cost of providing water service.  On June 16, 2015, the city approved a water rate fee refund program under which ratepayers who paid more than the water rate within their class between August 28, 2013 and June 30, 2014 would receive a partial refund of their rate.  In exchange, the recipient signed a release of further refund claims against the city.  A first claim for damages by plaintiffs was served on the city September 30, 2015, and a second on December 4, 2015.  The claims were denied as untimely and not within the refund program.  The parties stipulated to a bench trial to determine whether the one-year claim presentation deadline in Government Code section 911.2 and the statute of limitations barred the plaintiffs' claims.  The court determined the claims were untimely, barring the plaintiffs' claims.

The appellate court ruled that the trial court's findings that the claims were untimely was supported by substantial evidence.  Because a claim for damages from overpayment ordinarily commences when the overpayment is made, the one-year deadline for the claims started running on the due date for the last invoice reflecting the water rates--August 19, 2014.  The deadline for the claims was therefore August 19, 2015.  The claims were presented after that date.  Although the plaintiffs raised the issue of equitable tolling on appeal, they forfeited the issue by not raising it in the trial court.  The city did not waive the one-year claim deadline by allowing ratepayers to participate in the refund program until October 1, 2015, or by approving individual claims that were presented without participating in the program.  Waiver requires either an actual intention to relinquish a right, or conduct so inconsistent with any intent to enforce the right as to induce a reasonable belief that it has been relinquished.  Substantial evidence supported the trial court's conclusion that the city did not intend to relinquish its right to bar late claims that were outside the refund program; its stated intent in initiating the program was to "do the right thing."  The city did not act inconsistently with its rights; it approved claims only to the extent they sought a refund for overcharges during the same period covered by the refund program (August 2013 through June 2014) and denied claims that sought refunds outside that period.  By initiating the refund program, the city extended the time to seek refunds in exchange for the waiver of further claims; when it received individual claims after the October 1, 2015 cutoff, it rejected them as untimely.  The trial court correctly determined that the refund program did not reopen the time to present claims, because it was separate from the standard process by which claims were served and resolved.

 

Warrantless Seizure of Firearms in Household of Person Detained for 72-Hour Observation Did Not Violate Fourth Amendment; Second Amendment Argument Barred by Issue Preclusion

In Rodriguez v. City of San Jose, published July 23, 2019, the 9th Circuit affirmed summary judgment for the defendant city, its police department, and a police officer in a lawsuit brought under 42 U.S.C. section 1983.  Officers responded to the plaintiff's 911 call for a welfare check on her husband.  The husband was ranting, mentioned shooting up schools, and stated he had a gun safe full of guns.  The officers detained the husband under Welfare & Institutions Code section 5150 for 72 hours observation. After the husband was removed from the house, the plaintiff confirmed that there were firearms in the house.  The officers found 12 firearms in the house--one registered to the plaintiff alone, the rest unregistered or registered to the husband.  The plaintiff objected to the removal of her personal handgun.  The officers confiscated all of the firearms.  The husband was evaluated at the hospital, admitted, and released a week later.  Later, the city filed a petition for forfeiture of the firearms.  The plaintiff intervened, asserting personal ownership of her handgun and community ownership of the others.   She asserted her Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms, since she was not prohibited from possessing or owning guns.  The court granted the city's petition.  The state court of appeal affirmed that the seizure did not violate the plaintiff's Second Amendment rights.  After the decision, the plaintiff changed the registration and ownership so that all the guns were in her name only, and obtained gun release clearances from the state department of justice.  The city declined her request to return the guns.  She then brought this lawsuit, joined by two gunowners' rights organizations.  She asserted violations of her Second Amendment and Fourth Amendment rights.

The 9th Circuit affirmed the district court's decision that the warrantless seizure of the firearms did not violate the Fourth Amendment. The public health and safety protection exception to the warrant requirement applied.  A seizure of a firearm in the possession or control of a person who has been detained because of an acute mental health episode responds to an immediate threat to community safety.  When asking whether the seizure falls within an exception to the warrant requirement, three factors must be balanced, based on all the facts available to an objectively reasonable officer:  The public safety interest; the urgency of that interest; and the individual property, liberty, and privacy interests.  Here, the seizure of the guns from the home affected a serious private interest in the personal property kept in the home.  But because the officers had probable cause to detain involuntarily an individual experiencing an acute mental health episode and send him for evaluation; the individual had threatened to use the firearms; and the officers did not know whether the hospital would detain the individual or keep him detained long enough to permit the officers to seek a warrant, the urgency of a significant public safety interest was sufficient to outweigh the significant property interest.

The 9th Circuit also concluded that the Second Amendment claim was precluded by the final decision of the state court, in which the plaintiff's Second Amendment rights were litigated.  The addition of the advocacy groups as plaintiffs did not change the issue preclusion analysis, because they lacked institutional standing.  They failed to show that the issue of whether a single gun owner's firearms should be returned either impeded their ability to carry out their mission or required them to divert substantial resources away from the organizations' preferred uses.

Claimant Who Alleges Claim Is Timely Due to Delayed Discovery May Be Estopped from Asserting Public Entity Waived Untimeliness

In Estill v. County of Shasta, published July 31, 2018, the Third District Court of Appeal reversed an order granting new trial after the trial court granted the defendant county summary judgment.  The plaintiff, a jail employee, was the subject of an internal affairs investigation in 2009.  In September 2009, the sheriff's office served the plaintiff with a notice of charges in support of proposed termination.  She was then mistakenly denied entry into the jail based on the belief she had been fired.  She realized jail staff had improperly received information about her, and complained.  Throughout 2009, she received information that others were inappropriately discussing her investigation.  She heard rumors about the parentage of her son.  She was terminated effective January 2010, and her administrative appeal denied in September 2010.  During the first half of 2010, she heard more comments about her son and heard that people unconnected to the investigation were talking about her case.  In February 2012, she presented the county with a claim for damages.  The claim alleged that information about the investigation had been leaked, that gossip and rumors had been spread, that a hostile environment was created, and that the plaintiff was harassed.  The claim alleged that the incident occurred in September 2009, but that the plaintiff "first became aware" of the incident in September 2011.  The County responded with a denial on the merits under Government Code section 913.  It did not send a Government Code section 911.3 notice that the claim was untimely.  The plaintiff sued under various causes of action that required a claim.  During her deposition, the defendants learned that she was aware of the alleged wrongdoing as early as 2009.  It moved for summary judgment.  The trial court initially granted summary judgment because the plaintiff failed to present a timely claim.  It then granted new trial, concluding triable issues of fact existed on whether the defendants had waived the claim-timeliness defense under section 911.3 by not sending a notice the claim was untimely.

The appellate court concluded that the undisputed facts established that the claim was untimely, and that the plaintiff was equitably estopped from arguing that the defendants waived the claim's untimeliness.  Under the delayed-discovery doctrine, the plaintiff's cause of action accrued when she became aware that information from her IA investigation was leaked and being discussed by people at the sheriff's department and other agencies, she had a strong suspicion about the source of the leak, and she was aware people were making allegedly defamatory statements about her and her son.  It was undisputed that she learned of these facts and her cause of action accrued no later than July 2010.  Ignorance of the identifies of the alleged wrongdoers did not affect accrual, because the defendant's identity is not an element of her cause of action.  She had suspicion that someone had done something wrong to her.  Because her claim was untimely, she could not maintain a claim for damages against the defendants unless she was exempt or excused from complying with the claim requirements.  The plaintiff's argument that the defendants waived the late-claim defense because the section 911.3 notice was not sent failed, because she was equitably estopped from making that argument.  She represented that she did not become aware of the alleged wrongdoing until September 2011, and omitted from the claim the facts showing she became aware earlier.  The county was not aware of the true facts concerning her knowledge, and relied on her representation in not sending an untimely-claim notice.  Where, as here, the facts are undisputed, estoppel is a question of law.  Just as a public entity may be estopped from asserting noncompliance with the Government Claims Act when its agents prevented or deterred a claimant from complying, a claimant may be estopped from invoking the section 911.3 waiver provision where the entity's failure to notify the claimant the claim is untimely is induced by the claimant's representation on the form.  The county did not forfeit the estoppel argument by failing to plead estoppel in its answer as an affirmative defense.  A party is excused from pleading estoppel where the party is unaware at the time it prepares the pleading that the defense may rest on estoppel. The plaintiff's argument that the county misled her by not giving her notice of late-claim relief procedures fails because even if it had given notice, she would not have been able to pursue those procedures:  more than a year had passed since accrual.

Public Retirement System Immune from Tort Liability for Seeking Repayment of Pension Overpayments

In Krolikowski v. San Diego City Employees' Retirement System, published June 14, 2018, the Fourth District Court of Appeal, Division 1 affirmed judgment after a bench trial in favor of the defendant retirement system.  Decades after the plaintiffs, retired city employees, began drawing pensions, SDCERS determined that it had calculated the pensions incorrectly, and was overpaying the plaintiffs.  SDCERS informed the plaintiffs they would have to pay back the excess amounts, and that their payments henceforth would be reduced to the correct amounts.  Both plaintiffs pursue administrative appeals.  The plaintiffs sued SDCERS for conversion, breach of fiduciary duty, declaratory relief, and writs of ordinary mandamus (Code of Civil Procedure section 1085).  The trial court sustained demurrers on the tort causes of action, and then ruled for SDCERS on the remaining causes of action.

The appellate court affirmed the judgment on the tort causes of action on the ground of statutory immunity. The decisions to recover the overages were policy-level exercises of discretion that were protected by the discretionary immunity, Government Code section 820.2.  SDCERS was therefore entitled to the immunity under Government Code section 815.2, subdivision (b) (vicarious liability of public entity subject to any immunity that protects the employees for whose acts or omissions the entity is liable).  The court rejected the argument that the torts were not subject to immunity because they were based on provisions of the state constitution.  Since the state constitution did not create the conversion or fiduciary duty causes of action the plaintiffs asserted, the claims were based on common law, and thus subject to the Government Code immunities.  The court further held that the evidence in the case supported the trial court's ruling that no writ relief was appropriate, and that SDCERS was not equitably estopped from seeking the repayments.

School District May Be Estopped From Asserting That Claim Should Have Been Presented to District Rather than School Police Department

In Santos v. Los Angeles Unified School District, published November 29, 2017, the Second District Court of Appeal, Division 4 reversed summary judgment granted to the defendant school district based on the plaintiffs' failure to present a claim to the district.  The plaintiffs were involved in a serious auto accident with a Los Angeles School Police Department (LASPD) vehicle.  Before the plaintiffs were taken to the hospital, they received a business card with the LASPD seal, address, phone number, and website.  Four days later, through counsel, the plaintiffs presented a claim for damages to the City of Los Angeles.  The city denied the claim, and stated that LASPD was a separate public entity.  The attorney checked the LASPD website.  The website stated the question of whether LASPD was an independent law enforcement organization, and stated in response that the district maintains its own fully-accredited police department, but that LASPD is a separate entity.  The attorney called LASPD, and told a lieutenant that he needed to submit a claim form for damages to the LASPD.  The lieutenant told him that a claim form was available on the LASPD website and that he should mail the form  to LASPD.  He did not mention the district.  The attorney downloaded a "service complaint form" from the website, which did not mention the district.  In small print, it said, "For LASPD Internal Affairs Use Only."  The attorney filled out the form, attached the claim previously submitted to the city, and mailed it to LASPD.  LASPD did not respond to it until over a year later, after the plaintiffs filed suit.  At that time, LASPD wrote a letter stating that LASPD was not a separate legal entity, but was part of the district.  In addition, after filing the suit, the attorney (after many tries) received the traffic report, which listed the employer of the driver as LASPD, but the owner of the vehicle as the district.  The plaintiffs amended the complaint to name the district.  The trial court granted summary judgment on the grounds that LASPD was not an independent government entity, but part of the district, and that equitable estoppel did not apply because no reasonable attorney would have relied on the business card or the lieutenant's information in determining LASPD was the entity to which to present the claim.

The appellate court ruled that the plaintiffs could raise equitable estoppel, despite not having pleaded it.  The district forfeited the argument that they could not, and in any case, because the complaint could have been amended to allege estoppel without prejudice to the district, the trial and appellate courts could consider the estoppel argument on its merits.  The appellate court further ruled that the evidence described above raised a triable issue of fact on whether the district concealed the fact that it was the responsible entity.  The business card, the lieutenant's statements, and the website's assertion that LASPD was a separate entity raised a triable issue of fact on whether the district concealed that LASPD was not a separate entity.  Evidence supporting the reasonableness of the belief was the absence of mention of LASD on the business card, despite Government Code section 7530's requirements, and the city's denial on the ground that LASPD was a separate entity.  

Filing a Timely Late-Claim Application Does Not Excuse a Minor from Failing to File a Timely Late-Claim Petition

In J.M. v. Huntington Beach Union High School District, published on March 6, 2017, the California Supreme Court affirmed a lower court of appeal decision upholding denial of a Government Code section 946.6 petition for relief from the claims statute. The minor plaintiff was injured in a football game, and did not obtain an attorney or present a claim within six months of the date his cause of action accrued.  Nearly a year after accrual, the minor, through an attorney, filed an application with the defendant district for leave to present a late claim.  The district did not send out a notice regarding the application.  After 45 days, the application was denied by operation of law.  More than six months after the date the application was deemed denied, the minor filed his section 946.6 late-claim petition.  The trial court denied it as untimely.  

 Disapproving the earlier case of E.M. v. Los Angeles Unified School Dist. (2011) 194 Cal.App.4th 736 (which held that filing a timely late-claim application was sufficient even if the application was denied), the Supreme Court agreed.  Interpreting the Government Claim Act's statutes, the court concluded that even if a claimant was a minor throughout the claim-presentation period--and thus entitled to automatic relief if the minor files a timely late-claim application--the minor must still timely petition for relief if the application is denied, either by notice or by inaction.  The court further rejected the argument that the district should be estopped because it did not send notice of denial of the application, or that the time to file the petition was equitably tolled.  The minor failed to establish any injustice.  He simply failed to comply with the claims statutes, missing an easily ascertainable deadline that has been in place for over 50 years. 

Although Equitable Estoppel of Public Entities Disfavored, Extraordinary Circumstances Estop City That Promised to Build Parking Structure for Development from Declining to Build Structure

In HPT IHG-2 Properties Trust v. City of Anaheim, published December 21, 2015, the Fourth District Court of Appeal, Division 3 affirmed a trial court decision to issue a writ setting aside a conditional use permit the defendant city enacted.  The city planned to build an overpass.  The project required it to acquire land that would impact the plaintiffs' resort development, reducing the amount of parking available for the resort.  The city issued a conditional use permit for the development that set out the number of parking spaces required for the development, along with upgraded setback and landscape requirements.  The CUP was based in part on a parking study the city had approved.  The parking study showed a two-level parking structure on a piece of land the city would acquire.  The plaintiffs' asserted that the city had promised to build the parking structure and comply with the same setback and landscape requirements.  In reliance on the CUP, the plaintiffs designed their project with fewer hotel rooms, and with the required setbacks and landscaping.  After building the overpass, however, the city enacted a second CUP, the one at issue.  It allowed construction of a surface parking lot instead of the parking structure, and different setbacks and landscaping.  The trial court found that the city had made representations about the parking structure that it had changed after the plaintiffs relied on the representations; and that the city was estopped from issuing the CUP changing the plans for the parking.

The appellate court held that equitable estoppel is available against public entities only under extraordinary circumstances, and only where necessary to avoid great injustice.  But substantial evidence supported the trial court's conclusion that the elements of estoppel had been met; and that in light of the plaintiffs' acts in reliance on the defendant's representations, and their ignorance that defendants would change the design for the parking, extraordinary circumstances warranting estoppel were present.