California Agrees: Only One Hit on the American Pipe

Montoya v. Ford Motor Co., No. G045752 (D4d3 Mar. 12, 2020)

In 2018’s China Agritech v. Resh, the U.S. Supreme Court held that so-called American Pipe tolling tolls a class member’s statute of limitations only for the time a first filed class action remains pending. An absent plaintiff can’t stack together tolling periods from a bunch of different class actions to achieve an even longer tolling period. So once the first class action is dismissed, class cert denied, or the plaintiff opts out of a certified or settlement class, the plaintiff’s clock restarts without further tolling.

Here, the Court of Appeal adopts the rationale China Agritech as a matter of California state procedural law.

Reversed.