Case Number: VC064925 Hearing Date: June 16, 2016 Dept: SEC

MED-NET, INC. v. ELLIS
CASE NO.: VC064925
HEARING: 06/16/16

#5
TENTATIVE ORDER

Defendants ANDREW ELLIS and ELLIS LAW CORPORATION’s demurrer to the Second Amended Complaint is OVERRULED. C.C.P. § 430.10(e), (f).

Defendants have 20 days to serve and file a responsive pleading.

Plaintiff MED-NET is a medical provider. It brought the subject action against several of its patients for which it provided treatment (between March 1007 and April 2007) and for which payment was never received. See FAC, ¶8. The moving defendants acted as the attorney for those patients. As alleged, in around October 2013, defendants stopped providing status to plaintiff regarding the patients’ respective cases so that it could receive payment for the chiropractic and pain management services provided. ¶11.

In February 2016, defendants’ demurrer to the First Amended Complaint was sustained with leave to amend. The Court issued a detailed order regarding the pleading defects. Primarily, it found that plaintiff did not allege enough facts with respect to each account indicating its right to payment. Plaintiff adequately identified the outstanding liens, and pled sufficient facts to support its right to payment.

In the demurrer, defendants assert arguments with respect to certain accounts and whether they have been paid. Those arguments are not properly entertained at the pleading stage, as extrinsic evidence must be evaluated to determine the viability of the actual claims.

With respect to the timeliness of the claims, the Court has already indicated that unless the claims are clearly barred, a demurrer on the statute of limitations is properly overruled. Evaluation of a laches defense requires an evaluation of the evidence, and thus not a proper ground for demurrer here. Moreover, defendants argue that only some of the claims might be barred. Even if that could be established, it would not completely dispose of a cause of action.

Defendants have not identified a material pleading defect which would either require additional amendments to the pleading or render any particular cause of action improper as a matter of law. The demurrer is overruled and defendants instructed to answer.