MThis morning, the California Supreme Court held that the provisions of Proposition 64 do apply retroactively to existing cases (Californians for Disability Rights v. Mervyn's LLC) but that plaintiffs have the right to bring a motion to amend to substitute a new plaintiff, within the permissible scope of Code of Civil Procedure § 473 (Branick v. Downey Savings & Loan). The court announced no new law concerning the relation-back doctrine, and instead suggested that on remand, should plaintiffs file a motion to amend, trial courts should decide the motions by applying the established rules governing the relation back of amended complaints as stated in Norgart v. Upjohn Co. (1999) 21 Cal.4th 383, 408-409 ( “The relation-back doctrine requires that the amended complaint must (1) rest on the same general set of facts, (2) involve the same injury, and (3) refer to the same instrumentality, as the original one.”)
We know better than to think that our analysis would be any better or more detailed than Kimberly A. Kralowec's, who writes The UCL Practitioner. We are certain that she will have a lot to say about these landmark decisions sometime today, so check out her blog.
You can download the opinion in the Mervyn's case here in pdf or Word format, and the opinion in the DSL case here in pdf or Word format.
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