What Do You Expect from a Guy Who Sues Little League?

Hanna v. Little League Baseball, Inc., No. E070995 (D5 Aug. 18, 2020)

The Court of Appeal holds that the trial court did not err in declaring Plaintiff—a baseball coach in a beef with the national little league association—to be a vexatious litigant under Code of Civil Procedure § 391. The record reflected that as a pro se litigant, plaintiff had commenced, prosecuted, or maintained at least five civil actions in the preceding seven years that had been finally determined adversely to him. Thus, the trial court correctly stayed the case until Plaintiff posted a cost bond and dismissed it when he failed to do so.

The trial court should not, however, have ruled on the Defendant’s discovery motions after it filed its vexatious litigant motion. Section 391.6 specific provides that any litigation is stayed until ten days after the motion is denied or, if granted, ten days after the litigant posts a bond. It was thus an abuse of discretion for the trial court to rule on the discovery motion and issue $1,200 in sanctions against Plaintiff. 

Reversed in part.

Contract Interpretation, in Law and in Fact

Oakland-Alameda Colosseum Auth. v. Golden State Wariors, No. A157688 (D1d5 Aug. 18, 2020)

The parties’ arbitration agreement in this case says the arbitrator exceeds her authority by making errors of law. That effectively means that legal questions in the arbitration are subject to de novo review. But fact questions are essentially unreviewable. 

The main issue in the arbitration was whether a party “terminates” a contact by declining to exercise an option to renew. Following the two step parol evidence rubric in Pacific Gas & E. Co. v. G.W. Thomas Drayage Co., 69 Cal. 2d 33, 37–40 (1968), the arbitrator first provisionally considered some extrinsic evidence to decide whether the agreement was susceptible to more than one reading. After doing so, the arbitrator determined that the word “terminates” was, in fact, susceptible to both parties’ construction. That is a question of law, and the Court of Appeal holds it was a correct one.

In the second step of the PG&E analysis, the court decides which party has the better reading, in light of both the text and the extrinsic evidence. If the extrinsic evidence is not in conflict, this second step is a question of law. That’s the case even if there are competing inferences that can be drawn. On the other hand, if the evidence is in dispute, such as when credibility is at issue, the second step is a question of fact. This case presented the latter. It follows that, because the arbitrator in this case was required to resolve fact disputes, the arbitrator’s ruling in this case is unreviewable.

Affirmed.