California Appellate Report

Sometimes you put yourself in a pickle.  This one's definitely a pickle . Michael Schultz gets sentenced to prison in 1996.  He serves m...

So many things about this relationship just seem . . . strange. Part of it I understand.  Mr. Reuter is around 65 years old (at this point) ...

Want to see a Ninth Circuit judge absolutely tee off on a prior Ninth Circuit opinion?  Check out Judge VanDyke's separate opinion in th...

Rather than talk about the merits of this appeal , I simply wanted to propose a tiny change in the way in which the opinion discusses its pr...

I wonder what the backstory -- if any -- is behind this opinion . Pasadena attorney Kevin Moore represents a client in a mandatory settleme...

Sometimes even good bets don't pay off. Rami Al-Zetawi gets arrested for animal cruelty when his neighbors allegedly see him beat and in...

This is definitely a comprehensive opinion . It's essentially about a single issue:  Whether a public school district is a "busines...

This seems right. Defendant gets convicted, but dies during the pendency of his petition for certiorari to the Supreme Court.  As a legal ma...

I think that when there's a split of authority in the Court of Appeal and your opinion come out on one side of the split, you should usu...

You read all these Senate Bill 1437 opinions these days; it's a fair amount of work for both trial courts and the Courts of Appeal.  But...

This opinion by Justice Ikola certainly seems right. You want your pet cremated in a "private" cremation -- that way, they're ...

Here's someone who definitely ended up in a much better condition than her original status . In 2013, a jury convicted Patty Lamoureux ...

I readily admit that prosaic appellate opinions in California are probably not the highest priority for pretty much anyone in the post-elect...

Christopher Stockman is driving while intoxicated and hits a bicyclist from behind, killing him.  Mr. Stockman blows a .18 and .19 when he&#...

For some reason, I have a different reaction to this case than I typically have to cases arising out of our adversary system. Normally, I&#...

There's only one published opinion from the Ninth Circuit and California appellate courts thus far today.  And when I first saw it, I th...

Here's an interesting way to write an opinion .  You typically don't see the identities of the appellate counsel getting so much pla...

You can tell that the opinion is going to be a fairly lengthy one when the summary prepared by the staff of the Ninth Circuit is, as here , ...

Someone who puts on an electronic music festival -- here, Live Nation -- owes a duty to protect its patrons from overdosing on MDMA. So hold...

Jeffrey Foley is the grandfather of identical twins.  He molests one of them, who immediately reports it, and he's tried and convicted a...

Both the majority and the dissent agree that Amer Alhaggagi is a messed-up kid.  They just disagree over the nature of the mess. Judge Smith...

Don't send kiddie porn over gmail.  Google looks for it . It's a fairly chilling case from San Diego about how various women get &qu...

"In 2014, a single Riverside County Superior Court judge signed 602 orders authorizing wiretaps. To put that in perspective, all other ...

What a difference the panel makes. Agustin Ortega-Lynch gets caught helping to organize a cockfight, and the United States wants to deport h...

In one way, it's a routine offense :  burglary.  But in many ways, it's a strange couple of crimes.  There's clearly something a...

Defendant Villa is 28 and his girlfriend (and the mother of his child) is 18. "While driving with his girlfriend, Jane Doe, and their i...

David Zorich is eligible for potential resentencing if the vehicle he stole in 1997 was worth $525 or less.  That vehicle was (accordingly t...

When I read opinions, I sometime think:  "There but for the grace of God go I."  Or at least I try  to think that.  Whether as a v...

I wasn't overly interested in this opinion for the underlying legal doctrine, which involves the relevant limitations period for judici...

We rightly get irate at countries in which people are sometimes held without trial for years.  That's not right.  It's not due proce...

The relevant ethical rule says that a lawyer who's likely to be a witness can't represent a client "at trial."  But the Co...

I can't say that I knew much about how jockeys get selected and paid in horses races before today.  But as a result of this opinion , I ...