Washington v. Sacramento County Employee Ret. Syst. CA3

Filed 6/17/14 Washington v. Sacramento County Employee Ret. Syst. CA3 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA THIRD APPELLATE DISTRICT (Sacramento) ----

BOBBIE WASHINGTON, C074182

Plaintiff and Appellant, (Super. Ct. No. 34-2013- 80001365-CU-WM-GDS) v.

SACRAMENTO COUNTY EMPLOYEE RETIREMENT SYSTEM,

Defendant and Respondent.

Plaintiff Bobbie Washington challenges a judgment denying her mandamus petition to set aside a decision by defendant Sacramento County Employee Retirement System (SCERS), which denied her requests to rescind her 1986 election to withdraw her benefits from the system and to grant her a disability retirement. She suggests that she was ignorant of her rights or perhaps even incompetent or incapacitated when she made her 1986 election. She appears to add that SCERS denied her due process.

1

Beyond these bare basics of her claims, we are unable to decipher her arguments, let alone determine the facts and authority on which her apparent arguments are based. Because we find the opening and reply briefs, prepared by appellate counsel, are unintelligible and otherwise in violation of settled appellate rules, we deem any and all points raised to be forfeited. Accordingly, we do not reach the merits of Washington’s purported attacks on the judgment. BACKGROUND In October 1986, after the County of Sacramento (County) terminated her, Washington sent SCERS two signed forms. In one, she asked for a refund of her retirement contributions with interest, affirming: “I understand that by so doing I waive all future claim to any prior service rights due me except those that may be reinstated under the provisions of the County Employees’ Retirement Law of 1937.” In the other, she affirmed “my rights under [the 1937 law] have been thoroughly explained to me.” Washington appealed her termination. After she received a notice of proposed termination, she filed a February 1987 application for disability retirement. A prompt letter from SCERS advised that her that her application was incomplete due to a lack of medical information, which SCERS advised her to supply as soon as possible; SCERS also advised her to consider seeking counsel. SCERS received no reply. After the County Civil Service Commission--no longer a party herein--upheld her termination, SCERS refunded Washington’s contributions and interest in, as she requested, March 1987. In 1992, Washington wrote to SCERS, claiming she had been ill and could not remember what had happened. SCERS promptly sent her documentation of what happened. Washington repeatedly contacted SCERS, claiming it should revive her disability retirement application and mental incapacity prevented her from understanding the forms she signed.