Ford Motor Warranty Cases 5/8/17 CA2/8
In 2015, Ford was facing almost 775 Lemon Law (i.e., breach of warranty) cases concerning certain Fiesta and Focus models. The cases had been filed in 44 separate California counties. In Los Angeles, Ford moved to coordinate the cases before one judge, and the coordinated motion judge granted Ford’s petition as to 470 of the cases, which were venued mostly in southern counties. The coordinated case was assigned to the coordinated trial judge. Just a few months later, Ford petitioned to add-on 467 substantively identical cases, many of which had been recently filed, although some had been inadvertently or intentionally (for procedural reasons related to pending trial dates) left off of its first petition. The coordinated trial judge denied the add-on petition because, it felt, that Lemon Law cases are not amendable to complex management. Ford filed a writ petition. Held: Reversed.
Code of Civil Procedure 404 says that a petition for coordination shall be supported by a declaration stating facts showing that the actions are complex and that the actions meet the factors set out in Code of Civil Procedure 404.1. Section 404.1 says that “coordination of civil actions sharing a common question of fact or law is appropriate if one judge hearing all of the actions for all purposes in a selected site or sites will promote the ends of justice taking into account whether the common question of fact or law is predominating and significant to the litigation . . .” That section goes on to list the common sense factors that should guide the decision (e.g., the relative development of the actions, judicial efficiency, convenience of parties, witnesses and counsel; and avoiding inconsistent rulings).
The trial court found that only one factors weighed in favor of granting Ford’s petition: The “relative development of the actions and the work product of counsel.” In other words, all cases were at an early stage. All other factors weighed against coordination: The facts and issues in each case was individualized; it would be inconvenient for counsel and witnesses from San Diego, Riverside etc. to travel to court in Los Angeles; it was not judicially efficient; there was no risk of inconsistent rulings because each case is individualized; and, the cases were simple Lemon Law cases and not complex.
Given that a prior trial judge had already ordered coordination – basically confirming that the section 404.1 factors had been met for cases subject to the original petition, and would necessarily be met for similar future cases – the court placed special emphasis on the “relative development of the actions and the work product of counsel.” In fact, the court found that this “suggests the primacy of that factor in determining the propriety of adding a case or cases to a coordination proceeding.” If discovery and motion work for the coordinated cases had been going on for years, then dropping 400 new cases into the mix might be disruptive. However, the trial court had stayed the originally coordinated actions, and not much had happened in the interim. DCA8/2 found that the coordinated trial judge’s denial of the add-on petition acted as a repudiation of the earlier judge’s order granting coordination.
The court also found that Lemon Law cases can meet the definition of “complex” cases because of the large number of represented parties in related actions pending in different counties. The court then proceeded to do an analysis of each factor listed in section 404.1. This is very much worth reading, if only for the description of the flexibility and latitude the coordinated trial judge has in managing a coordinated proceeding:
Final thing to note:
- Based on precedent, the court found that review of the trial court order denying coordination is de novo. The rationale — “[T]his is a decision which requires the ‘exercise [of] judgment about the values that animate legal principles,’ and hence the concerns of judicial administration . . . favor the appellate court, and the question should be classified as one of law and reviewed de novo.”