Davis v. Superior Court

Opinion

RUBIN, Acting P. J. Leon Davis petitions for a writ of mandate directing the trial court to enter its final judgment so that Davis may file a notice of appeal. We grant the petition.

FACTS AND PROCEEDINGS

In October 2008, Leon Davis filed an employment discrimination complaint against his employer, the City of Los Angeles. The city moved for summary judgment. In a minute order dated October 1, 2009, the trial court granted the city’s motion for summary judgment. The minute order stated: “The Motion is tentatively granted pending issuance of the Court’s final written ruling, [f] LATER: Order Granting Summary Judgment is signed by the Court and filed this date. A copy of the order is sent via U.S. Mail to [671]counsel below, [f] For the reasons set forth in the Order, the Motion for Summary Judgment is GRANTED.”

The clerk of the court served the parties by mail with a copy of the minute order. The clerk’s certificate of mailing identified the served document as “NOTICE OF ENTRY OF ORDER,” and attested she had served “Notice of Entry of the above minute order of 10/01/09 . . . .”

The clerk attached to the minute order the court’s written ruling filed that day, entitled “Order Granting Summary Judgment.” The written order’s first paragraph stated, “The court grants summary judgment in favor of the City because Plaintiff has failed to raise a triable issue of fact that race or age was a motivating reason.” The order continued by discussing Davis’s lack of admissible evidence that the city discriminated against him. The order then closed with a single, underlined sentence on its third page stating: “Judgment is therefore entered in favor of Defendant and against Plaintiff on all causes of action in the complaint.”1

About three weeks later on October 21, 2009, the city filed and served on Davis the city’s “[Proposed] Judgment.”2 The proposed judgment stated: “The Court having granted summary judgment in favor of defendant City of Los Angeles, IT IS ORDERED, ADJUDGED, AND DECREED that plaintiff Leon Davis shall take nothing by his complaint against defendant City of Los Angeles and that this action be and hereby is dismissed, [f] Defendant City of Los Angeles shall recover its costs in the amount of $_.” That same day, the city also filed its memorandum of costs, which the court awarded to the city. The court did not, however, act on the city’s proposed judgment. The Los Angeles Superior Court’s on-line case summary contains an October 1, 2009 entry reading, “Order (. . . GRANTING SUMMARY JUDGMENT)” but contains no notation showing entry of judgment or notice of entry of judgment.