In re Alpha Media Resort Inv. Cases, No. A150541 (D1d3 Sept. 16, 2019)
This case arises out of a $170 million fraud scheme for which the Defendant was criminally convicted. Defendant participated sporadically in the case, and failed to show at his deposition or at trial. In coordinated litigation, Plaintiffs here won about $10.5 in total judgments. Defendant argues (1) that his case should have been dismissed under Code of Civil Procedure § 583.310’s five-year rule, and (2) somewhat orthogonally, that his case should have been stayed pending the criminal case against him.
There’s no doubt that the case took a long time to get to trial. But the case was complicated and the Defendant recalcitrant. The trial court found that, for a significant portion of time, it was “impracticable” to bring the case to trial under § 583.340(c), and thus the 5-year limit had not lapsed. Given that such a determination is within the sound discretion of the superior court, the Court of Appeal won’t disturb it, so long as it has some basis in fact and reason. It did so here.
So far as staying the case due to the criminal charges, that too is a matter on which the trial court has a lot of discretion. The trial court didn’t abuse its discretion in denying a stay here. Among other things, Defendant had plead guilty before trial in a deal that the government wouldn’t bring additional charges. So Defendant’s Fifth Amendment concerns about giving testimony in the civil trial were speculative at the least.
Affirmed.
No comments:
Post a Comment