Jung v. Kim CA2/5

Filed 5/18/22 Jung v. Kim CA2/5 NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions not certified for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 This opinion has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.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

SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION FIVE

SAM S. JUNG et al., B307413

Plaintiffs and Respondents, (Los Angeles County Super. Ct. No. v. BC687833)

JOON W. KIM et al.,

Defendants and Appellants.

APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of Los Angeles County, Rupert A. Byrdsong, Judge. Affirmed. Daniel E. Park Law Corporation and Daniel E. Park for Defendants and Appellants. Katz Appellate Law and Paul J. Katz for Plaintiffs and Respondents.

Sarah Woo (Woo) and Sam S. Jung (Jung) (collectively, plaintiffs) obtained a default judgment against Joon W. Kim (Kim) and C4 Capital Partners, L.P. (C4) (collectively, defendants). We consider whether the trial court correctly denied defendants’ motion, filed well over a year later, to set aside the default judgment on defective service grounds.

I. BACKGROUND A. The Lawsuit Kim was Woo’s financial advisor. During the spring of 2012, Kim allegedly persuaded Woo to invest money in C4, a limited partnership for which Kim is a general partner and the agent for service of process. Woo allegedly invested nearly $400,000 in C4 and then transferred $332,300 of that investment to Jung in exchange for a promissory note. C4 allegedly did not report taxes during 2014, 2015, and 2016, and defendants allegedly failed to provide Jung with a Schedule K (a document used to report a partner’s share of the partnership earnings, losses, deductions, and credits) to file with his state and federal tax returns. In December 2017, plaintiffs filed an initial complaint against defendants for breach of fiduciary duty and failure to provide financial information.

B. Service of the First Amended Complaint Plaintiffs maintain they served defendants with the original complaint via substituted service at 1148 Iguala Street, Montebello, CA 90640 (the “Montebello address”), which is both a home address and C4’s business address per California records. Plaintiffs later filed a first amended complaint (the operative